


Lifeblood

by PantyDragon



Category: Forgotten Realms, The Legend of Drizzt Series - R. A. Salvatore
Genre: Arguably underage sex depending on how you define drow physiology, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, M/M, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Rape, There will be sex, pre-novels, reciprocal relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-19
Updated: 2015-03-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 23:10:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 34,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1487566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PantyDragon/pseuds/PantyDragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"What has been your world all these years, Zaknafein, if not the darkness?”<br/>For a long while he did not reply. "My world has been empty.”<br/>“Save for me,” Jarlaxle reminded him pointedly.<br/>Zaknafein smiled cynically. “Yes, how could I forget you?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Kenoth Usstan'sargho Zhah Queelas O'gothen (Unearned Arrogance is Quickly Remedied)

**Author's Note:**

> I have been working on this for nearly a year in drips and drabs, and I've somehow managed to write an entire novel (though in non-consecutive order, meaning there's a lot of work I still need to do to fill in the gaps). I was going to wait until it was finished to start posting it, but I've made enough progress that I decided to publish as I go.

They called it the Crucible: a huge, circular, labyrinthine structure perforated by ten narrow doors along the outermost wall. It was the pride of Melee-Magthere, and one of the most effective artificial training arenas that the Academy’s masters had yet devised; providing a chance for the strong and the intelligent to utilize their skills, and for the weak to be weeded out. Every student would run the Crucible at least a dozen times in his tenure at Melee-Magthere. Those who met with repeated success might face it half a hundred times, and those who were unfit sometimes would not survive. It was only an exercise, to be sure - blades were dulled and projectiles padded - but accidents did happen. Politically convenient accidents, as often as not.

Zaknafein Do'Urden prowled the catwalk encircling the arena. He and his fellow students were permitted to watch the earlier bouts as they waited their turn in the obstacle-ridden maze. Walls were rearranged after each round so as not to give the spectators unfair advantage, but much could be learned regardless.

He glanced upward as a tongue of purple flame burst to life in midair over the center of the arena. First two doors, then a third snapped open and combatants hurried into the maze. The fourth lagged by another three seconds or so, and the fifth and sixth followed in rapid succession. Zaknafein glanced quickly at the first few, but kept his eyes on those who started latest, watching the anxiety build in their faces and their twitching hands as they counted their lost seconds. The staggered start was meant to simulate the sort of disadvantage that one would have in real combat. Maybe it was preferential, maybe not. It didn't matter; no two paths into the labyrinth were the same, so encounters happened entirely at random. He knew already that any advantage offered by an early start was negligible, but the sort of flightiness it espoused in the slow starters was what separated the competent fighters from the fearful ones.

The seventh and eighth doors opened, and two more students sprinted from their starting positions. Within the labyrinth, two had already engaged, the striking of dulled weapons ringing out through the vaulted arena. Zaknafein could not see the fight from where he stood, but he heard the losing boy's cry of pain. The winner of that scrap was the next to go: someone had snuck up on him as he'd been distracted.

Doors nine and ten remained shut, even a solid twelve or thirteen seconds after the start of the game, and while one of the students seemed wound as tight as a bowstring in his impatience, the other gave Zaknafein pause.

It was one thing to be relaxed, quite another to be flippant.

The second remaining student - a slender young drow with daringly short hair - had removed one of the eight or ten small, dulled throwing knives from his belt and was, apparently, scraping dirt from beneath his fingernails as he waited for his door to open. Zaknafein tilted his head in disdain. He wouldn't last long with arrogance like that. It was almost as though he was aware of being watched, and was making a show of boredom. Zaknafein resented him immediately, and suddenly found himself personally invested in the boy's defeat. It would be a pleasure indeed to see that long-suffering look swept from his cocky face.

The last two doors finally opened, and the anxious student was off like a bolt, but the last boy sauntered through as though he had nothing at all to fear. Zaknafein's brows knitted together, almost enraged by how careless he seemed.

He took a few steps into the arena, glancing from one wall to the next and rising onto the balls of his feet as he walked. Zaknafein moved a little further along the catwalk to watch him. Lifting a hand, the young drow below touched the walls on either side of the pathway, clearly intent on something. Suddenly, he burst into a sprint, leapt to plant one boot against the right wall, and vaulted himself high enough to grab onto the lip of the opposite wall. With seemingly little effort, he pulled himself up, straddled the partition, then regainined his feet, balancing along the narrow top. The moderators watched, looked up at one another, but said nothing. Cheating was a very subjective concept in drow society, and everyone watching seemed interested to know what he would do.

Zaknafein conceded that it was a clever strategy. He was less maneuverable atop the wall, but it was unlikely that any of the other combatants would be guarding against an attack from above. As long as he moved quietly and was careful which paths he took, he could take anyone he encountered by surprise.

Walking as easily and as lightly as a cat on a fence, he picked his way carefully nearer the center of the maze, making no rush about it and casting his gaze out as far ahead as he could manage. He would stop occasionally to cock his head and listen.

Zaknafein was perplexed. The boy had passed very near another student on the floor of the maze already, but had not made a move. As moments slipped by to the sound of clangs and shouts he neglected opportunity after opportunity and simply crept toward the center of the labyrinth, passive and careful. It smacked of cowardice, and Zaknafein's disdain crept up his throat again.

The students in the maze slowly encountered and defeated one another, sometimes with stealth and sometimes with force, and still the short-haired young drow waited - crouched - and did nothing.

Finally, after long, tense, minutes, Zanafein saw him shift his weight, easing back into a standing position and, belatedly, he understood why. There were only two other students still in play. Zaknafein recognized them both as skilled fighters, he had sparred with one himself just weeks ago. The paths they were on were leading them toward each other and - by consequence - to the feet of the waiting assassin. He drew two throwing knives; hard enough to sting but - as per the rules - too dull and light to do permanent damage.

The boys below found each other, and sword met dagger as the more aggressive of the two drove down with his blade. Both were too intent on one another to notice their carefully perched observer.

Even at a distance, the smirk on his face betrayed how easy his task had become. With a dramatic flick of his wrist he sent one knife flying into the smaller boy's jugular, drawing blood and making him flinch in shock. The second had only enough time to glance upward, catching a sarcastic half-salute from his assailant before the second blade struck his bared throat.

Zaknafein felt cheated. A winning strategy was a winning strategy, but it burned him to see cheap games trump legitimate skill.

His teeth clenched involuntarily.

Lowering his gaze, he drew a slow breath through his nose.

The arrogant cur wouldn't be able to pull off the same trick twice, he was sure of it, and he was determined to be there when the egotistic ploy collapsed on itself. Winners were always pitted against each other sooner or later. All he had to do was win a game himself.

He could do it easily. And moreover, he would enjoy it.

Two of his fellow students stood near him on the catwalk, murmuring animatedly to each other as they watched the victor climb carefully down from the wall. They, on the contrary, looked impressed. Purposefully, he took a few steps closer until the boy nearest him looked up.

"Who is he?" Zaknafein asked bluntly, tilting his head toward the arena below to make his question clear.

The young drow beside him smiled - Reas Oblodra, the boy was called. The name had come slowly in his preoccupation.

"It surprises me that you do not already know, Zaknafein," Reas chided, and his companion smiled condescendingly. "Much is said of him."

Zaknafein scowled, making his impatience apparent.

"He is of the First House," Reas amended finally, "Jarlaxle Baenre, _L' dobluth_." _The one cast out._

Zaknafein glanced back down at the arena for a clearer look. He did know of him, but had never before connected the name to the face. It made sense now; the flippancy, the unchallenged bending of the rules. Jarlaxle was of the first house, the living thirdboy, believed to be blessed by Lolth.

It also made sense that Reas knew of him so readily. His own Matron, mother of the Third House, was a powerful psionicist, and several years ago had made a statement - possibly a prophetic one - that had unsettled every female in the drow city deeply. “ _He is an agent of chaos,”_ she had mused. _“One day, Jarlaxle will speak, and every Matron in Menzoberranzan will be beholden to him.”_

A smirk crept across Zaknafein's face.

He would hear Jarlaxle beg for mercy, and would judge for himself the potency of his words.


	2. Nindyn Vel'uss Kyorl Nind Ratha Thalra Elghinn dal lil Alust (Those who Watch their Backs Meet Death from the Front)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you happened to wonder, all the chapter titles are Drow sayings or proverbs (some of which are canonical, some of which I made up).

Zaknafein was, indisputably, one of the most talented fighters that Melee-Magthere had ever seen, and his prowess was hardly a secret. Even before entering the academy he had spent torturous hours training himself to a level of precision that many soldiers never achieved in their lifetime, and even now, only a year and a half into his formal education, there were few who could stand against him in the sparring arena. The Matrons of the higher houses coveted him, for even at his young age he was a valuable asset, and his skill would only grow with time.

Thus, it was a quiet, well-placed confidence that assured him of his superiority over the First House's eccentric young rogue. That same confidence kept his fingers from tapping at the grip of his sword as seconds ticked by, leaving his door into the labyrinth unopened.

He flexed his shoulders and kept his breathing steady, reassuring himself of what he already knew. It was a mind game - all of it - the Crucible, with its pitfalls and traps and blind corners, and the staggered start that gave a false disadvantage.

He wondered if Jarlaxle was in the maze yet, and burned with frustration at the thought that someone else might disqualify him before Zaknafein even entered the arena.

It was a childish, baseless grudge and he knew it, but he allowed himself to indulge in his rage. He had had little else to occupy himself with.

_Seven seconds…eight seconds…_

Both palms were sweating slightly, but he could not risk changing the grip on either of his swords to dry them. He stared intently ahead and tried to focus on something else.

With a snap, the door finally unlocked (sixth? seventh? he couldn't be certain), and a rush of excitement urged every taut muscle to action. He moved swiftly into the labyrinth, but did not dare a full run. Heavy footfalls were easier to hear, and there were likely traps he would have to look ahead for. A pitfall or tripwire would not only make him vulnerable, but could easily break a bone or turn a joint, and he couldn't take such a risk out of a petty thirst for confrontation.

Sticking close to the right-side wall, he marveled distractedly at its smoothness. He had never considered it before, but making it from the floor to the lip of the wall was quite a feat of agility. It was about twice his height, and Jarlaxle was - by his estimation - a hand's width shorter.

Remembering himself, he glanced furtively upward, and realized that he would be hard-pressed to keep constant watch on both the floor ahead of him and the wall above.

Blades at the ready, he rounded a corner, but retreated back around the bend when he heard the sound of approaching footsteps. Pressing his back to the wall just out of the line of sight, he turned his head and listened.

Heavy breathing suggested either high anxiety or a recent confrontation. If the latter were the case and the student was still in play, it meant he had won, and was therefore not to be trifled with.

As he drew closer Zaknafein could hear a slight drag in his steps.

Exhaustion or injury, then, so the latter. He would be shaken, probably on edge.

Force, in this case, would serve better than stealth.

When - by the sound - the boy was nearly abreast of him, Zaknafein held his blades parallel, spun, and threw himself into his startled opponent's path. The turn had been blind, and his dulled swords missed their mark by a disappointingly wide margin, but the shock on the boy's face was satisfying indeed.

Without giving his target time to recover, he shifted his grip, turned the blade in his right hand, and slashed up at his opponent's ribs. Unable to bring his own sword to bear, the boy blocked with his forearm, leaving a deep bruise but nothing more. It would not have been a viable strategy had the sword been edged - Zaknafein might have cut clean through - but game rules dictated a fatal blow or nothing, so the trick saved him.

Zaknafein was forced to sidestep as his opponent recovered enough to counter with an unrefined downward slash, but it was an easy dodge. In proper hand-to-hand combat he found his stride easily.

His opponent was tired already, and startled. Zaknafein was nothing of the sort.

Eighteen blows, that was all it took: eleven from Zaknafein and seven from his opponent. Seventeen were dodged or deflected, but the last one cracked a rib; dealing what would have been a killing blow from a bladed sword.

The boy fell to his knees in pain, and the dweomer over the arena placed him in an immobilizing ring. It was a way of ensuring that no one could continue to fight once eliminated, and it would likewise protect him from any opportunist with ulterior motives.

Zaknafein turned away coldly, blades in hand, and resumed his single-minded pursuit.

He kept his gaze on the wall above as he prowled the narrow, angular pathways of the maze. Though piercingly alert, he felt a stirring of adrenaline low in his stomach, a vibration of his nerves that flowed all the way through to his fingertips. This, finally, was something he reveled in; this was a rush. It was no longer simply a game. He was a predator, and for once he was not wandering aimlessly, waiting to stumble upon likely opponents. He was hunting.

His face showed little emotion, but his eyes burned in anticipation of the clash, and a sweet, inevitable -

"The universe loves irony, doesn't it? Keep your eyes up, meet death from below."

Zaknafein's heart missed a beat, and he turned faster than he could have blinked. It was remarkable how assured he was of that lilting voice, even having never heard it.

He was not disappointed.

Head cocked, pale eyebrow raised, his hand on his belted hip and an amused smirk on his parted lips, Jarlaxle Baenre stood only steps away, regarding him with something akin to condescension.

Zaknafein's throat tightened. How had he moved so silently? And perhaps more critically, why had he sacrificed his obvious advantage for the sake of a patronizing quip?

Anticlimactic. It wasn't what Zaknafein had pictured this encounter being.

He widened his stance regardless.

Jarlaxle winced emphatically and clicked his tongue in disapproval. "I would be still if I were you," he warned, his tone as imperious as his manner would suggest. "I suspect you have not taken my meaning."

Zaknafein scowled more deeply by way of reply.

"Look _down_." Jarlaxle said, his voice dry with exasperation.

"And let you take me off guard? I think not."

Jarlaxle rolled his eyes and chuckled something to himself. "I have already caught you off guard once, and my choice not to profit by it is proving disappointing thus far, but if such is your concern…" The dagger he had held in his hand slid back into his belt and he crossed his arms over his chest, glancing meaningfully toward Zaknafein's feet.

Cautiously, and with a healthy dose of distrust, he did as he was bidden.

Strung above the floor, just inches from the back of his leg stretched a taut, slender tripwire. He couldn't discern what manner of trap it might trigger, but he almost certainly would have broken it had he not been stopped.

_Why?_ Why not take the windfall? Why be so conniving one moment and toy with false honor the next?

"I fear you may not be as intelligent as I had anticipated," Jarlaxle lamented, "though I have been reliably informed of your talent. Nevertheless, if you would be so kind as to suspend your idiocy for a moment and step _away_ from the wire, I would be delighted to engage you properly."

Zaknafein paused for a moment, deflated. In some regard he was seething with quiet rage, but it was directed as much at himself as his abrasive opponent. He had been careless, and had placed himself in such a position that the very target he so resented had saved him from a moronic mistake, and possibly a serious injury.

The fire had gone out of him; the high-minded fantasy of his victory had crumbled, but he certainly was not about to let Jarlaxle get the better of him again, and certainly not in pitched combat.

Gingerly, he stepped closer, away from the trap, weighing his blades in his hands and letting his eyes flow systematically over his opponent, sizing him up.

Jarlaxle was, as Zaknafein had surmised, a bit shorter than himself, and perhaps slightly more slender. His weight rested on his left hip, but until a moment ago he had held his weapon in his right hand. Zaknafein recalled that when he had eliminated the final two students in his earlier bout, he had thrown both knives with his left. He now carried six of the same small, sleek weapons and long knife. The arrangement was different than it had been for his first bout, and Zaknafein wondered if he had yet acclimatized to a new blade.

He seemed incredibly relaxed, and he showed no signs of being injured, but this seemed so ingrained in his demeanor that it was difficult to tell if he had yet encountered another combatant. Curiously, he also wore several thin bracelets, two on one wrist, three on the other. Zaknafein was immediately suspicious of the apparently impractical jewelry, but enchanted items of any kind were not allowed in this training arena. Another dweomer over the labyrinth would have identified them immediately had they been magical.

Had he simply chosen conceit over efficiency?

Zaknafein found himself frustratingly uncertain.

His greatest talent lay in reading and anticipating his opponent's moves, but he could tell by the sly smile lurking eternally behind Jarlaxle's eyes that _his_ talent lay in defying anticipation.

"Lost our nerve, have we?" He teased, stepping close enough to see Zaknafein's pupils dilate, but making no move to retrieve a weapon.

Either Jarlaxle was baiting him to attack out of anger, or he really loved the sound of his own voice.

Probably both.

He burned to snap back, to make some clever, rapacious retort, but he bit back the impulse and let his sword speak for him. In a flash, steel rang against steel. Zaknafein slashed at his opponent's shoulder, but was surprised at how quickly Jarlaxle was able to react, even at such close quarters. His knife – held in his right hand – had caught Zaknafein's blade against its crosspiece and pushed it wide, leaving his midsection uncomfortably exposed, but the lapse lasted only an instant as he brought the second dulled sword back in to deftly turn aside a short retaliating jab from Jarlaxle's knife. His opponent's speed continued to impress him, as Jarlaxle managed two more barely-parried slashes before Zaknafein was even able to take a step back.

He had to keep distance between them, he realized quickly, for he had a much longer reach, due both to his height and his choice of weapons, and Jarlaxle would undoubtedly be able to keep him back on his heels at close range. Apparently quite aware of his disadvantage, Jarlaxle dove back in immediately, closing the gap with a preemptive duck to anticipate a wide slash, but Zaknafein countered by unexpectedly rushing forward headlong, striking both of his blades against his opponent's with such force that point of contact left gouges in the metal and numbed Zaknafein's left arm to the elbow. The trick was, he had been braced for it, Jarlaxle hadn't, and the smaller drow took the full force of the painful clash to his wrist. Unable to properly parry Zaknafein's next right-hand thrust, he was forced to roll out of the way, but he had no trouble trading the knife to his left hand and rushing in again, slashing upward at his opponent's diaphragm.

Zaknafein brought up both swords to block the blade's path, but it never connected. Jarlaxle pulled the move at the last second and instead let fly a throwing knife with his injured but apparently still capable right hand. Zaknafein dodged, thinking that it was meant for his chest, but it struck instead exactly where Jarlaxle had intended: just at the joint of his wrist. Involuntarily, his grip on the handle of his sword loosened, and Jarlaxle struck upward once again, catching the blade and sending it spinning out of reach. He made no move to retrieve it, just changed his stance and lunged forward, forcing Jarlaxle back on his heels.

“They were not wrong about you,” Jarlaxle congratulated, his words clipped, not with exhaustion but excitement. “I am enjoying myself immensely.”

Zaknafein replied only with a flurry of blows, hoping that stopping to chat would have distracted him at least slightly, but immediately proven wrong. If there was one thing Jarlaxle could do without effort, it was talk. The rogue matched him strike for parry in both directions, as fast as anyone Zaknafein had yet faced, and twice as gleeful about it.

The stern young drow could not have denied that he was similarly enthralled. Jarlaxle was every bit his equal, though very different in technique. Every blow they exchanged was simultaneously effortless and furious, and each fed the other's flood of adrenaline.

With a clever dodge, Jarlaxle coaxed Zaknafein's remaining sword low, only to strike immediately at his unguarded throat. His stomach clenched in alarm, and he snapped his sword back up just in time, managing to come between knife and flesh, but with only inches to spare. Jarlaxle grinned widely and put his weight against his weapon, leaving Zaknafein's sword effectively pinned to his chest, and without enough leverage to push his opponent back.

They were deadlocked for a heartbeat, and Jarlaxle had the clear advantage. His slightly stiff but not immobilized right hand was still free to snatch a knife from his belt and finish the bout, but he paused for an instant to bore into Zaknafein triumphantly.

Zaknafein seethed, even as he struggled to keep Jarlaxle's knife at bay.

Suddenly, with the slightest of movements, Jarlaxle's eyes left his opponent's and fixed on something over the taller boy's right shoulder. Zaknafein could feel the pressure on their locked blades wane in his distraction. Suspecting some sort of trick, he kept his hands steady and his eyes forward, but what Jarlaxle did next was unpredictable, even by his standards. He turned his knife sharply, lowering his opponent's sword for an instant so that its tip nearly touched the floor, then dropped his weapon entirely and drove his fist into Zaknafein's stomach.

Unprepared for the sudden blow, he reflexively curled over, gasping, pressing his hand to his abdomen in pain and struggling not to vomit. He braced for a strike from a knife, knowing it would eliminate him and knowing that he would be unable to retaliate in time, yet the flash of opportunity passed and nothing happened.

Instead, he heard an exclamation of surprise and a metallic clatter, then a dull pattering, like droplets of water on stone. Forcing down the nauseating ache, he straightened up, raising his head.

Jarlaxle had taken half a step backward, but while his piercing gaze was still focused beyond Zaknafein, his jaw and throat now glowed with a quickly-expanding, white-hot splash of infrared light that could only have been blood. Far behind Jarlaxle on the floor lay a short knife, still spinning slowly, and still warm with the body heat of its wielder. It had been edged, and an instant ago it had flown squarely for Zaknafein's spine.

Jarlaxle - still swift as a cobra in spite of his bleeding throat - slipped a knife from his boot, ignoring the ones at his belt, and flung it viciously at his assailant. Zaknafein had recovered enough to turn, and the corner of his eye caught the strike as their opportunistic attacker was taken off his feet, the throwing knife - clearly sharpened as well - buried four inches into the flesh just below his collarbone.

The look in Jarlaxle's eyes could have frozen salt water as he pressed his fingertips to the open wound beneath his jaw. The blade had missed his carotid by a hair's breadth, gouging a deep cut from below his chin all the way into his hairline near the base of his skull. He'd turned his head reflexively, trying to dodge, but hadn't quite managed in time.

Suddenly grim, covered in his own blood, and seemingly oblivious to the recomposed Zaknafein, he stepped around him to close in on the would-be assassin. As he approached the boy, who was painfully regaining his feet, his left hand pulled at a bracelet on his right wrist. With the turn of a clasp, it unraveled into a long, slender length of cable, and Jarlaxle wound each end around his palms.

Far too late, the boy tried to draw his sword, but Jarlaxle slapped it out of his hand easily. With effortless grace and a well-practiced twist of his arm, he looped the garrote around the boy's neck, turning to press his knee into the small of his back and forcing him flat to the floor, using the boy's own weight to tighten the cable's bight. Desperately, he tried to slip his fingers between his neck and the garrote as it tightened, but again he was not nearly swift enough, and was helpless to impede the merciless, painful pressure on his throat. He gasped once, but then was silent as he thrashed weakly.

"I do hope you are in pain," Jarlaxle murmured, leaning in close and speaking with chilling dispassion, "savor it. If you have ruined my face I should flay you inch by inch until nothing is left but a grinning skull. You would long for so quick a death as this." He jerked the cable sharply for emphasis, forcing a near-inaudible mew of agony from the boy's gaping mouth. His throat grew hot with the stress, and his neck and beneath his eyes swelled from the pooling blood that was starving his brain of oxygen. The thin garrote had cut deeply into his flesh, drawing blood that ran in rivulets into his collar. Fear and desperation - the certain knowledge of his impending death - shone in his wide eyes as he clawed at his throat.

"Now you are to learn what so many dead men know too well:" Jarlaxle added quietly, "if you intend to kill… _do it properly_."

Zaknafein felt a sudden twinge of pity for the pathetic wretch, but forced it aside. The boy would gladly have killed either of them; Jarlaxle wore evidence of that from his face to his chest. To bring an illegal weapon into the arena was to invite whatever violence it roused in response. By drow standards, Jarlaxle was entitled to his retaliation, even the moderators would have agreed. It was barely a step beyond self-defense.

As such, it was doubly surprising when he suddenly released one end of the cable, letting the reeling boy slump to the floor with a frantic, shuddering gasp, and furled it slowly back around his hand. As the rogue unsteadily regained his feet, the dwoemer encircled the semiconscious boy and Jarlaxle smirked.

"No praise is in order," he announced, throwing a hand out dramatically and wincing his way through a half-smile as he turned back to lock eyes with Zaknafein once again. It was a common thing to say in Drow; it typically meant that the victory had been too easy to bear mentioning, but there was a patronizing sting to it this time, betrayed by the knowing glint in Jarlaxle's eyes.

Zaknafein's grip tightened briefly on his sword as Jarlaxle took a step closer, but it was purely instinct. His feet dragged, and his hand pressed tight to his jaw as blood continued to run warm between his fingers and down his sleeve. The wound was not life threatening, but it was serious, and Jarlaxle was weakening as his shirt grew ever more saturated. Zaknafein wondered suddenly if he had truly let the boy live for the sake of mercy, or because his shaking hands simply could no longer hold the cable tightly enough to finish the job.

He stumbled once and recovered, but just a few feet from his still-armed and very much uninjured rival, he turned to press his back to the wall and let himself sink unconcernedly to the floor.

"Why did you do that?" Zaknafein demanded quietly, sheathing his dulled blade and moving cautiously closer.

Jarlaxle laughed breathlessly, shifting to search for something in his pocket and not finding it. "Because," he sighed, "if I had told you to duck, you would not have listened."

"No, I…" he trailed off, thought better of it, and instead knelt and asked "Are you alright?"

Jarlaxle was beset by another fit of slightly painful amusement. "I think I shall be, thanks in no small measure to your doting concern."

Zaknafein's jaw tightened slightly, and Jarlaxle's smile widened in spite of the pull at his wound. "You have not attacked me." He observed, casually tearing a strip of cloth from the hem of his undershirt. "The moderators will be wondering why, given your former…inclination." With his piercing gaze still boring into Zaknafein, he coiled the piece of fabric loosely and put it in his mouth, rolling it on his tongue until it was wet through with saliva.

Zaknafein did not look up, sure enough as it was that there were expectant eyes on him. "There hardly seems reason enough," he shrugged, letting his tongue touch his lips uncertainly, "you can barely stand."

Jarlaxle's smile waxed devious. "As though I need to."

Zaknafein blanched, suddenly aware of the dulled knife hovering inches from his left side, clutched in Jarlaxle's blood-slicked hand. He had let himself come too close, and had been blinded by a moment of sympathy. _Stupid. Childish._ But as quickly as he had drawn it, Jarlaxle replaced the knife at his belt and smirked imperiously.

"I concede."

Before he had even finished the last syllable, the purple flame signifying the end of the game roared to life, and then blinked out immediately. They had been the last two in play. The bubbles of energy released the remaining students, and the walls of the labyrinth began to sink slowly into the stone floor, returning the room to a standard, level gymnasium. The ragged breathing of their assailant became suddenly audible once again, drawing both of their gazes for a moment.

Mercy or lack of conviction? Were the two mutually exclusive?

"I've not beaten you." Zaknafein announced determinedly as he stood. "Not in my own mind, at least."

"I shall give you something to strive for, then," Jarlaxle promised, pulling the cloth from his mouth and plastering the sodden strip to the wound along his jaw. Pain and irritation gathered across his forehead as he pinched the cut closed, probing it gently with his fingers as the bleeding slowed. "What do you think?” He asked, turning his face up a bit. “Should I have flayed him?"

Zaknafein's brow furrowed in disbelief. “Your vanity is staggering.”

“But not misplaced.” He contested, without hesitation. Much to his own surprise, Zaknafein nearly laughed.

The wall dropped out from behind Jarlaxle as the floor finally swallowed up the last of the maze, but instead of standing to leave the arena, he leaned forward, resting elbows on knees.

“Do you intend to sit and sulk over your damaged face all day?”

“If I feel so inclined,” he retorted.

“You shall have to do it on an empty stomach, then,” Zaknafein reminded him, “it's past mid-light already.”

Jarlaxle huffed dismissively and Zaknafein dared the shadow of a smile. “Feeling lightheaded?”

“Do not patronize me, you flat-footed son of a lower-House rothé,” he snapped, though without much conviction. A grin cracked Zaknafein's ever-scowling face. “I should have let you trip over your own feet, then _I_ would be laughing as _you_ bled on the floor. I shall seduce all your daughters! And perhaps some of your sons, should the fancy strike me.”

Zaknafein never laughed. He was an automaton so possessed of a devotion to the art of combat that he had room in his heart and mind for little else, yet at that moment he could hardly breathe through the fit of suppressed laughter shaking his already-sore stomach. Something in the absurdity of Jarlaxle's arrogance – which in some regard was so well-deserved that it was an understatement, but which now was ludicrously inappropriate – made him strangely and inexplicably magnetic.

“I would hope that any future children of mine would have better taste.”

Jarlaxle smiled again.

Leaning over, he took a brusque hold on Jarlaxle's upper arm and pulled him to his feet. He did not stumble, but nor did he refuse the help.

“I look forward to facing you again, Zaknafein,” he announced as he let himself be guided from the arena, “you interest me immensely.”

“If you were ever to stop talking,” he replied, still smiling in spite of himself, “I might feel likewise.”


	3. Neitar ori'gato natha jaluk morfeth detholir's (Never Let a Boy Make Decisions)

The Underdark was not a cold place, not in the literal sense. Even so far from the light of the sun, the earth keeps her deep-dwelling creatures warm, with none of the capriciousness of the open sky. Menzoberranzan sees neither scalding drought nor biting frost. Drow weave no warm cloaks or heavy blankets, for even the cruelest frost does not reach the depths of the earth.

Yet there were times, as now, when Zaknafein was consumed by a biting, unshakable chill; a blight that sank far beneath his bare skin and stayed with him, tenacious and undaunted by clothing and flesh alike.

“I am good to you, Zaknafein.”

His silence conceded.

“Far better than you deserve, for the insolent child that you are.”

He could hear his heart pounding in his own ears, his ragged breath rushing in his throat and passing like ice over his damp, trembling lips.

Her slender fingers slid through his hair and down his neck.

He kept his head bowed.

“What a shame.” She hissed, “a body like that wasted on a lowborn soldier.”

He tasted blood and had no recollection of where it had come from, though he might have hazarded half a dozen guesses.

“Look at me.”

He obeyed.

She smiled, her crimson eyes dark. She was beautiful. Many would gladly have died for her.

“I should have you on a leash, my pet. You are temptation incarnate.”

Her fingers alighted on his throat, trailing down his collarbone.

“You are mine.” Her voice dripped with poison, sharp as a predator's teeth. “I know the games boys play at the academy, I know the lustful gazes that surely follow you already. I will suffer no one else's scent on your skin, Zaknafein, do you understand?”

“Yes.” The word stung of copper, he could barely find breath enough to speak it. “Yes, mistress.”

“How obedient you are.”

His pulse quickened with dread, and the cold deepened as she pulled his hair back, exposing his ear.

“How obedient, I wonder?”

* * *

 

Warm, sulfurous water lapped at Jarlaxle's skin, seeping into the bandage and stinging his fresh cut. He paused, wincing slightly as he peeled the sticky strip of silk from his jaw and inspected the sutures with his fingertips. It had bled a bit as he slept, but the stitches were neat and even, and the wound had pulled closed nicely.

He had dressed it himself, confident and precise in spite of the unsteadiness of his hands. Students as young as himself were not given healing potions or balms unless their wounds were life-threatening, and he did not trust a medic to be half as careful as he had been, even with only a tiny fragment of gold-backed mirror to work with in the dark. Pain was a lesson taught well and early to drow males, and Jarlaxle learned more aptly than most. A few dozen pricks from a needle were trifling.

Satisfied that his face was, in fact, not irreparably damaged, he leaned back against the lip of the pool and allowed himself a few hedonistic moments to fully appreciate the heat of the water.

Males at the academy were permitted to bathe only once every three days, on a rotating schedule that separated them partially as agemates and partially by House rank. This was not dictated by any shortage - Menzoberranzan had flourished in this region of the Underdark largely because of its plentiful resources and abundant subterranean streams - but females were allowed to bathe every day, and if males were given the same privilege in any regard they might begin to think too highly of themselves.

There were three natural volcanic springs within the city. Two were channeled by aqueducts for use by the higher Houses, but the third pooled along the cavern wall at the base of Tier Breche, within a stone's throw of the Academy, and had been therefore relegated for the students' use. The naturally water-worn stone had been carved out into a wide, rectangular basin, supplemented by the divergence of a small cool spring nearby that kept the pool from stagnating. The cave wall encircled it on three sides, and a natural overhang served as a ceiling, but mostly-decorative support pillars had been added to separate it a bit from the academy grounds.

Jarlaxle had never been particularly fond of the lack of privacy, but then, he couldn't be accused of exceptional modesty either.

Pensively, he slid his hand up the nape of his neck, tangling his fingers in pin-straight locks, and found a solid grip. He frowned. He'd have to cut it again. If he could hold on, so could anyone else; one less advantage in a culture that took great pride in elegant hair. He smiled to himself. He wondered if the Do'Urden boy would still call him vain if he just shaved it down to the skin.

He was vain.

He was not sorry for it.

Still smirking, he dampened his hand and rinsed his sutures delicately. _I took a knife to the face for you and you would have the audacity to call me vain._

He knew himself to be a good judge of character, and he had decided in an instant that he liked Zaknafein. No insult the boy threw - and he suspected there would be many more - would change his opinion now that he had formed it. He was not so easily provoked. There was a spark of sincerity behind Zaknafein's eyes that intrigued him.

Absorbed though he was in his systematic reverie, there was never a moment in his life when Jarlaxle did not have one ear pricked or one eye trained on his surroundings. Thus, he was not as surprised as he might have been to hear soft, bare footfalls on the stone behind him.

“Well, you have not _quite_ managed to look hideous.”

Jarlaxle suppressed a smile. “That,” he retorted seamlessly, “would be nearly impossible.” Turning with deliberate nonchalance, he glanced up to find – inexplicably – Zaknafein Do'Urden staring down at him, looking characteristically stern, but considerably less clothed than usual. “Good evening, _jatha'la dalninil_ ,” Jarlaxle crooned, “how very kind you are to see to my well-being.”

Ignoring Jarlaxle's patent sarcasm and swallowing the “elder sister” jab, Zaknafein sat on the warm, damp stone at the edge of the pool and folded his ankles beneath him. “His name was Reitus DeVir,” he announced, “and he is dead.”

“This is not your bath rotation,” Jarlaxle pointed out, gesturing vaguely to the ceiling. “Are you fucking an instructor, or -”

Zaknafein's glare subdued him, as well as anything might subdue one such as Jarlaxle.

“If he is dead, it is not my doing,” he insisted flatly, failing spectacularly to change the subject. “I have used a garrote before; rarely to fatal ends, and only when I intended it.”

“He was dismissed last night. And subsequently assassinated for daring to attack one of the First House. Matron Yvonnel cannot let an affront like that stand.”

“Oh, I am touched by her doting.”

“But Reitus did not attack you. Not intentionally.”

“Yes, but you will recall that I witnessed the affair,” he turned to display his lacerated throat pointedly.

Zaknafein did not speak, just _looked_ at him. Profoundly and incisively.

Jarlaxle could feel the roar and tumult of the grave young drow's thoughts behind his amber-red eyes.

“Do you think his fate unjust, Zaknafein?”

His jaw shifted. He had clearly considered this at length, and the range of answers flashed across his face. “No,” he replied. Quietly, but with confidence, “he knowingly brought ire upon himself, and he has paid for it.”

“Then why does it trouble you?”

He planted his palms behind him and leaned back. “Call it a whim.”

Jarlaxle's eyes narrowed perceptively and he turned to rest his elbows on the stone edge of the pool near Zaknafein’s knee. “You want to hear, I think, that I acted out of neither staunch self-preservation nor vengeance.” He held Zaknafein's gaze, neither wavered. “You want to believe that it was my respect for you that compelled me to save your life, and some innate sense of mercy that dissuaded me from ending Reitus's. You want to trust me, but you are far too clever for that. You doubt yourself.”

Zaknafein's glare softened, though only slightly. “And should I trust you?”

Jarlaxle smiled, running his thumb over his bottom lip. “Certainly not. You _should_ trust no one. But if you choose to, in spite of what you know to be your better judgment, it would say a great deal about you indeed, Zaknafein Do'Urden.”

He looked away for a moment. “Was it mercy?” He murmured, as much to himself as anything; acutely aware of the tone of his voice, as the Drow word for “mercy” was the same as that for “cowardice.”

“If you need to ask, then you certainly do not trust me.” Jarlaxle lamented, raising an eyebrow. “Pass judgment as you will. Regardless of what I intended, his troubles are over, so it makes no difference. Now, this is a _bath_ , Zaknafein, so either join me or be on your way, because I will not suffer you if you smell like a kobold, regardless of the quality of conversation.”

Zaknafein found himself struggling not to smile. It was becoming a pattern, these stirrings of amusement. He did not know what to make of it.

With only a moment of hesitation, he edged down into the scalding pool and distractedly gathered his hair at the nape of his neck.

“You never did say who you had to service to facilitate our chat,” Jarlaxle prodded, irreverence clear across his rather winsome face. He was genuinely burning with curiosity, as students were rarely allowed to deviate from their ranks and schedules. Unless, of course, someone of authority had a different schedule to keep.

Zaknafein seemed disinclined to answer. Instead, he watched the bracelets slide down Jarlaxle's wrists as he trailed his fingers in the water. “Are you never unadorned?” He asked disdainfully.

Scandalized, the rakish young drow gave a short, imperious laugh. “I think the real question here is: which one of us is never unarmed?”

Zaknafein paused to duck his head underwater briefly, and brushed droplets from his eyelashes before taking a closer look. “Are they all as clever as the garotte?” He wondered aloud, “or are some of them just for vanity?”

Jarlaxle chuckled good-naturedly. “Can it not be both?”

“Show me.”

“You know the trick to one of them, and rarely does anyone get that far with their life. I cannot reveal all my secrets.” He flicked his wrist and the metal bands clinked together musically.

“And you spoke so highly of trust a moment ago. Am I not worthy of yours?”

“I did warn you,” Jarlaxle chided, “but reconsider, perhaps, your mentation on trust to account for the fact that I have not killed you yet, in spite of having ample opportunity.”

Zaknafein, this time, allowed himself a dry smile, though he had no doubt of the truth in Jarlaxle's words.

“Your ears are pierced.” Jarlaxle remarked, reaching over to push a lock of hair away from his companion's temple.

Zaknafein recoiled sharply. “So are yours,” he snapped.

Jarlaxle paused, acutely aware of the way Zaknafein's whole body had gone rigid. “Yes,” he agreed, “but mine have been so for years, whereas yours are hardly a few days old, and healing poorly by the look of it.” He bit his lip in response to Zaknafein's glare, but did not quite manage to look apologetic. “Do forgive my curiosity, I meant no offense.”

Distractedly, he combed his hair through his fingers to hide his newly-pierced and painfully swollen ears.

“And who pierced yours?” Zaknafein wondered, not noticing for the first time, but intrigued nonetheless. Earrings were uncommon among drow. Piercings as fashion were a human tendency, not taken well by the considerably more delicate elvish ears. The only cultural significance they held to drow was largely a lost practice, but some of the more traditionalist houses still pierced the ears of males captured in battle.

Jarlaxle smiled enigmatically. “Tell me yours and I shall tell you mine.”

Zaknafein rolled his eyes. “Regardless, I imagine the opportunity to wear more jewelry pleased you more than a little.”

He laughed, running a finger over the garnet stud in one earlobe. “There is an art to finding pleasure in pain.”

“If one takes pleasure in looking peacockish, I imagine.”

Jarlaxle grinned widely and did not deny it. “So you say, as you tend to that exceptionally elegant hair of yours.”

With a disapproving glare, Zaknafein finished wringing out what was, in truth, a genuinely striking frost-white mane, and let it fall back over his shoulder. He knew that Jarlaxle was provoking him. He had no say whatsoever about the style in which his hair was kept; it was maintained by order of House and class. As a member of a lower noble House and not born of the Matron's family, he wore his hair as any Do'Urden soldier would: straight, slightly tapered, and long enough to touch the center of his shoulder blades. He was allowed to tie it back, but such was the extent of his control.

Jarlaxle – in this as much as in any other respect – was an anomaly. There was no prescribed hairstyle for the third son of the first Matron Mother, as no other had yet survived more than a few hours' time. Jarlaxle’s solution had been to cut all of his off.

“Looks better than yours,” he countered, and it sounded a bit of an impotent retort, even to himself, but he was struggling to seem unaffected.

Jarlaxle laughed, genuinely. “That it does,” he agreed, “oh how the women must love you, Zaknafein, devoted to decorum as you are. You shall be invited to all the temple orgies - ” Suddenly, the mirth was stripped from his face and his brow furrowed. “Oh,” he murmured, disturbing the water's surface as he turned to look over his shoulder. Through clenched teeth, he growled something unintelligible.

Instantly attentive – and now wise enough to make the most of it – Zaknafein registered approaching footsteps: booted feet on damp stone, someone alone, walking with purpose. He remained relaxed, but turned just enough to follow a figure walking toward them out of the corner of his eye. Careful not to stir even the slightest of waves, he stretched out his hand toward his companion.

Jarlaxle, preoccupied as he was, balked quite noticeably when his train of thought was interrupted by Zaknafein's fingertips on his ribcage just below the water. He registered a flash of alarm, but quickly realized that Zaknafein was carefully forming hand signs against his skin

Jarlaxle almost smiled proudly.

In infrared, hot water glowed an even and disorienting bright orange. Jarlaxle could not have seen properly what Zaknafein was trying to communicate, but by simplifying his gestures, he had made the widely understood Drow signs intelligible by touch, and – conveniently – invisible to anyone approaching.

What Zaknafein had asked thusly was. _Bad news?_

Surreptitiously, Jarlaxle reached for where he estimated Zaknafein's forearm to be, and Zaknafein obligingly cupped his hands together.

He signed, more easily, against his companion's palms. _I can handle this._

The consternation etched across his face suggested otherwise.

Zaknafein remained unflinchingly where he was, in spite of the warning glare.

“Shirreth,” Jarlaxle deadpanned, by way of greeting, and the approaching student stopped short. Zaknafein finally dared to turn and look at him directly.

Shirreth Tlabbar was firstboy of the sixth house: high on the pecking order and older by several years. Zaknafein recognized him easily. All the males of house Tlabbar had ash-colored hair and rather exceptional crimson eyes. Shirreth was fully clothed, making it clear that he had no real business being here. He ignored Zaknafein entirely, fixing his bright eyes on the uncharacteristically silent Jarlaxle.

“Jarlaxle,” Shirreth replied in an unnervingly syrupy tone, “I have missed our little talks. I assume you are not busy.”

Jarlaxle quirked an eyebrow humorlessly. “As it happens, I am.” He leaned against the edge of the pool and rested his forearms lavishly over the smooth stone. “I mislike your _assumptions_. I was under the impression that I had made that quite clear to you.”

Shirreth's expression turned dangerously cold. “I care very little for what you like.”

Sensing greater danger than Jarlaxle had deigned to reveal, Zaknafein instinctively scanned the immediate area. Of the dozen or so other boys milling about, only two had stopped to watch the encounter, and by the way they had edged closer when Shirreth spoke, it seemed they were not spectating idly. He was sure that Jarlaxle had noticed as well.

“Bold words for one of a lower house,” Jarlaxle warned, pushing himself quite gracefully out of the pool to stand toe-to-toe with Shirreth. He did a rather impressive job of looking imposing, in spite of being both slightly shorter and very much naked, but there was nothing of his normal bravado about him. “We had an arrangement, Shirreth, a short-lived arrangement that I am not interested in continuing.”

“As it happens, _I am_.” Shirreth echoed, taking a step forward that forced Jarlaxle uncomfortably close to the water's edge. “No favor without payment, thirdboy, and payment you yet owe.” Jarlaxle scoffed incredulously at that, though none of the tension released from his shoulders. Shirreth's attention shifted suddenly to Zaknafein, who had remained silent but alert and motionless. “Dismiss your pet soldier,” he ordered, brushing his fingers in a tender threat down Jarlaxle's throat, his voice a dark murmur. “Unless he wants to watch.”

Jarlaxle shot a sidelong look at his companion.

Zaknafein suddenly grasped the precise nature of Shirreth's interest in Jarlaxle. His teeth clenched as he noticed that the two attentive onlookers were now far too close. Jarlaxle's fingers plucked at a bracelet behind his back, but Zaknafein was quite sure that he could not fend off three older, larger, more experienced, and possibly armed assailants with only whatever small weapons he could hide on his person. The uncharacteristic grimness of his expression seemed to confirm that assumption.

Zaknafein was on his feet and out of the water in a flash, and Shirreth was forced to shift his posture slightly to account for the sudden involvement of a second party: one who was notably taller and exceptionally stern.

Zaknafein fixed his eyes on Shirreth, then – pointedly – on the two who had drifted over to flank him, just to make himself clear. “You will want to be on your way,” he warned, quietly and with more threat than he had initially intended. He sensed more than saw Jarlaxle's startled glower in his direction.

Shirreth narrowed his eyes in disbelief and his hand slid into his pocket. “And why is that?”

Zaknafein's throat tightened. He knew he could take any one of them in a fight, but he had no real leverage. If Jarlaxle attacked a member of the sixth house, no one would bat an eye, but if he – of the tenth house and not even noble, at that – involved himself, he would be subject to the wrath of the entirety of Faen Tlabbar, and that, certainly, he would not survive.

He regretted the decision instantly, but he was long past the point of backing down.

On what amounted to a desperate impulse, he glanced to his companion, almost apologetically, then snarled, “He is spoken for, Shirreth.”

For a fraction of a second, Jarlaxle's eyebrows raised in quiet, amused surprise.

Drow is not a literal language. Meaning relies on tone and context as much as on formal definition. It is a thing tailor-made for deceit, for a lie is easy when the words used are so inherently unclear.

Yet everyone within earshot knew precisely what Zaknafein had implied.

Jarlaxle once again had to fight not to smile; not sure whether to be flattered or pleased or confused, but his expression was quickly swept blank, eclipsed by a more pressing anxiety:

Shirreth was not going to accept that. Not from someone of a lower house.

Sure enough, he seemed on the verge of laughter. He turned once again to Jarlaxle, his mouth twisting into a vicious smirk. “Spoken for, are you thirdboy?” He touched his tongue his lips, nodding toward Zaknafein. “Well? How is he, then?”

Jarlaxle played the halfhearted bluff for all it was worth, consummate actor that he was, all the while surreptitiously twisting a gemstone out of its setting behind his back. “I would say better than you, but it is a low mark to beat.”

Shirreth's eyes flashed, and Jarlaxle turned his head slightly, bracing for a blow as he prepared his own retaliating strike, but Shirreth hesitated. His gaze fell to the garish wound along Jarlaxle's jaw, and then, slowly, turned to Zaknafein.

Amber-red eyes glared back at him, and a perfect, voracious grin spread across Zaknafein’s face.

For the first time, uncertainty settled on Shirreth's brow, and Zaknafein's wicked silence let it grow into stirrings of fear. Finally, he took a step back.

“Take your lackeys,” Zaknafein warned, his voice a level purr, “and find what you want somewhere else.”

“You play a dangerous game, Do’Urden.” He snarled, taking another step backward. “Look ever over your shoulder.” Finally, he turned to wave off his clearly disappointed reinforcements and the three of them slunk away, still bristling and – by the look in Shirreth's eyes - clearly not intending to let the matter rest for long.

Jarlaxle drew in a long breath, slightly stunned that the encounter had ended with neither bloodshed nor abject humiliation, and Zaknafein stared after their assailants, outwardly quite calm.

“What was that?” He asked suddenly, and Jarlaxle was forced to look up from the task of replacing the gemstone cap on the poisoned needle.

“A mistake,” he sighed at length, “well, a series of small…mistakes. A pity to tarnish my record, as I make so few of them in general but...” he shrugged, “nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

Zaknafein looked back to him, perplexed. “And what might you have gained?”

“Primarily? A braggart by which to channel information out of another house. But beyond that, well...” he raised his eyebrows suggestively.

Zaknafein shook his head in disapproval, turning away to retrieve his clothes.

“Not all of us are at the beck and call of beautiful women, _d'anthe mrand'sins_ , we must sometimes make do with pretty fools,” he teased, amused by the way Zaknafein stiffened with hostility. Whether it was a response to the “dear lover” barb or to being called out on a personal affair hardly mattered.

He seized the taller boy's elbow, stopping him dead.

“He will not let you alone now,” Jarlaxle warned, “he thinks you violent enough to cut my face apart out of jealousy and he would suffer no punishment for killing you.” Before Zaknafein could respond, he felt Jarlaxle's free hand slip a bangle over his knuckles to his wrist. Tactfully, Jarlaxle pretended not to notice the wince Zaknafein gave at his touch. Beneath his fingers, Zaknafein's skin was rubbed raw from thumb to mid-forearm. Jarlaxle recognized it immediately as rope burn, but declined to comment. “This is called a draa golhyrren,” he explained quietly, turning Zaknafein's wrist over, “Each terminal conceals a needle. The stone is a sleeping poison. The ram's head...well, the same thing, but considerably more permanent.”

Zaknafein pulled away, sliding the bracelet off over his hand and offering it back. “You have no obligation to protect me.”

Jarlaxle's hands went to his hips and remained there. “You did not complain the first time, though your gratitude was similarly moving.”

“I do not need assassins' tricks,” he murmured, “or jewelry.”

“Dispose of it then,” he shrugged, “though if I hear tomorrow that your throat was slit as you slept, I shall think you a fool.” With an air of finality, he turned to collect his own belongings.

Zaknafein laughed softly, pulling his shirt on over his head and slipping the bracelet into his pocket. “I will see you tomorrow,” he promised.

Jarlaxle did not turn back to look at him, but his whole body radiated a smile like heat in the darkness. “I trust that you will.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dedicated to my friend bonbonbunny, who insisted that Zak and Jarlaxle "just hang out naked sometimes because they're bros like nbd."


	4. Natha Wael Er’griff Morfethe natha Fel’ir Melq (Only a Fool Takes a Fair Trade)

Jarlaxle did not see Zaknafein the next day, and for a few hours he felt a stirring of anxiety that was as troubling as it was unfamiliar. But as was his wont, he always heard much more than he saw, and what he heard from one of his many fair-weather friends at the Academy was that Shirreth Tlabbar had been found disarmed and neatly run through the heart with his own blade before morning. There had been no witnesses, no evidence, and therefore – in spite of a furious Matron – no subsequent investigation. This was how it went in Menzoberranzan.

Jarlaxle had smiled wickedly at that.

Everyone had a game to play, and Zaknafein, so he had shown, was no exception. The question was one of motive. He had not killed Shirreth for his own benefit, that was clear enough.

“This does not make us even,” he mumbled aloud to himself, grinning up at the stone ceiling above his bed as Narbondel's light faded, “your life was worth ten of his.”

He ran his thumb over his lips and decided, judiciously, that perhaps he would need that bracelet back after all. As such, he might have to go out of his way to ensure that he and Zaknafein crossed paths again in the near future.

The ideals of the drow Academy left no room for idle socialization; alliances between males could only lead to trouble. Jarlaxle, however, had a very specific set of talents that allowed him to keep a web of communication in place. It was just a matter of knowing which string to tug.

* * *

 

Zaknafein had managed very little rest for the last several nights. Drow do not sleep in the same way humans do, and rarely do they dream, but it seemed to him that as soon as he closed his eyes he was gripped by a vague but inescapable fear. He woke frequently, with no memory of the dark visions hat had haunted him, but cold all over and with an unshakable sense of dread rooted deep in his stomach. He had learned not to make a sound in the crowded barracks, not even in his sleep, but he often had to press a palm to his mouth and wait for the shaking to stop.

He took no real pleasure in killing Shirreth, but on the night thereafter Zaknafein rested soundly for the first time in longer than he cared to remember. He woke rested but gloomy, knowing he would likely not find peace again for a while. As he sat up, something small and soft slid off his chest and landed on the back of his hand. He gave a slight start, disturbed by the realization that someone had managed to creep up to his bed without waking him.

Cautiously, he flipped the object over, and by touch and the dimly-glowing heat from his hand he found that it was a square of leather folded into an envelope and bound with string, about half the size of his palm. As he untied it, a scrap of vellum fluttered out to settle near his thigh. Inside the envelope was a slick, waxy substance that smelled rather pleasantly of resin. He rubbed a bit of it between two fingers curiously and reached for the vellum. That only puzzled him further. Ordinary ink was invisible in infrared, and few places in Menzoberranzan had visible light of any kind. With a quiet sigh he tried rubbing a bit of the slippery stuff on the hide. Nothing happened, but as he ran the pads of his fingers over it, he noticed long, uneven scores in the surface.

Pensively, he laid the scrap on the inside of his forearm. Where the vellum was scored thin his body heat shone through orange, but where it was intact it remained a cool yellowish. Clever.

When he tilted his head to read it, his brows knitted together.

' _Face me at your best or I will consider it a personal insult._ '

His jaw tightened and his throat corded slightly. With a sharp jerk he tore the vellum in half and dropped it onto his threadbare ticking. Reflexively, he closed a hand around one burning wrist and _squeezed_ until his arm was half-numb. He needed no reminders of the marks she left him with. Pain was easier to bear than pity.

For a single, furious moment he nearly refused the gift on principle, but – however deeply he might regret it – he couldn’t deny that he had made himself Jarlaxle’s business, and suffering did not abate suffering. He held his still, icy silence for a few beats, then slowly let out a trembling breath, released his grip on his raw skin and brushed his fingers into the balm.

The coolness of it on the underside of his arm was deeply pleasant. To his surprise, he quickly felt the slight itch of a healing potion at work, and though the magic in it was laughably weak, it was a small marvel that Jarlaxle had acquired it at all. When the skin along his forearms had begun to mend he tried gingerly to apply a bit to the piercings in his ears. They’d become infected, he could already tell, and the pain of touching them was now so intense that he didn’t dare press the solution into his skin.

As his bunkmates began to stir around him he dressed quickly and slipped the pouch into his pocket. Humoring an afterthought, he gathered up the pieces of torn vellum and carried that with him as well.

Until the end of their second year at Melee-Magthere, males were not allowed to eat until they had won a bout of hand-to-hand combat. Anyone unfortunate enough to lose had to wait until midday. They were sorted into random groups of twenty, placed in a room together, and paired off. The ten losers were allowed to keep fighting one another until only one was left hungry, but often the pack of less skilled students exhausted themselves fighting again and again until tactics got brutal and dirty out of desperation.

Zaknafein had missed two meals in the last three tendays, though only because he’d been ganged up on out of spite.

In the narrow hallway outside the barracks a disinterested overseer picked students by number and waved them off in one direction or another. Zaknafein half-heard his instructions made his way to the second floor of the main complex, but as he hurried beneath the archway he was stopped by one of the instructors.

“Where are you headed?”

Zaknafein’s brow furrowed and a Pavlovian fear clenched his gut. “Arena five.”

“Not anymore. Arena one is a body short.”

He hesitated, but swallowed a protest. Lesser masters outranked overseers, so if he was to be reprimanded, he would rather have disobeyed the latter. Dubiously, he turned back and headed down the stairs.

As soon as he stepped inside his newly-assigned arena he stopped dead for an instant, struck with the overwhelming suspicion that he’d been played.

“Not _you_ again.”

Jarlaxle smiled broadly as Zaknafein approached him, his steps quick and sharp. “That is no way to greet your only ally in the room.” Glancing over each of the other eighteen boys waiting in the arena, Jarlaxle flipped the short sword he held end-over-end and caught it neatly by the handle. “Popular though you may be.” Zaknafein could feel their eyes on him. It was something he was accustomed to by now, but even the combat moderator gave him a cursory once-over.

“Gods save me from an ally like you.”

“There is no god that can outsmart me.” Jarlaxle said with a wide smirk. “Now go pick a weapon before all the good ones are taken.”

Zaknafein narrowed his eyes and chewed the inside of his cheek as he strode to the array on the wall where ugly, battered training blades were kept. Ruefully, he realized Jarlaxle had spoken too soon. The only single-bladed swords left were badly weighted and mismatched. He could handle a spatha reasonably well, but this was a game where something was at stake and he resented a disadvantage.

Jarlaxle paced in a slow, cautious circle as Zaknafein mused over his limited options. The room was already growing restless. Subtle shifts in gaze and stance let him know who was singling out whom. He watched the eyes of each boy in the arena alight on the nape of Zaknafein’s neck as each considered for a moment how they might fare against the young favorite.

The combat moderator – a distinguished-looking young drow with very light eyes – shot Jarlaxle a strange smile as he took a few loping steps into the center of the room. Jarlaxle’s brow furrowed. The protocol was to give a ten-count warning for everyone to pair off, then a second order to begin. Protocol was not followed. As Zaknafein’s palm finally came to rest on the grip of a broad blade with comparatively few notches, the moderator whistled sharply and shouted the command to start.

Though most of the students turned to attack the nearest body at hand, two saw their window and threw themselves at Zaknafein before he could fully turn to face them. He caught a hard blow to the shoulder from the tip of one dull blade, but managed to duck the second boy’s swing and knee him hard in the diaphragm as he straightened up. When the boy staggered, Zaknafein slammed the flat of his blade against his opponent’s ear and sent him crashing to the floor. The other boy had already lost his nerve by the time Zaknafein turned to him, but it was far too late.

Though reluctant to miss the captivating performance, Jarlaxle had his own problems. The room had quickly dissolved into a free-for-all. He smoothly sidestepped a boy who’d been knocked off his feet and then spun to cross blades with someone who’d attacked him in a panic, purely for lack of another direction to turn. The moderator watched it all with an idle grin, keeping score not by the touch of a fatal strike but by which boys ended up choking and bleeding on the floor. He didn’t catch Jarlaxle’s glare.

Zaknafein’s lungs swelled with a shuddering breath as he stepped around the third assailant he’d thrown to the ground in the few seconds since the chaos had begun. He bent quickly and took the defeated boy’s swords, kicking the spatha aside. They were hardly exemplary, but they were an improvement. The blow to his shoulder had tweaked a muscle and it ached badly, but he stood with a firm surety that would never have suggested it. The room was already thinning out: the losers either yielding or in too much pain to stand. Officially, Zaknafein had won a bout – several bouts – and was entitled to leave, but rules were only as good as their enforcement, and that was sorely lacking. He wasn’t about to turn his back on a room full of people who wanted to see him bleed.

The fourth boy to approach had a glint in his eye that put Zaknafein immediately on edge. He’d been waiting, keeping out of arm’s reach and letting a few rash opportunists take their turn. Zaknafein didn’t know him, but he was smart enough not to face a fresh adversary, and that alone made him a threat.

His opponent made a halfhearted feint to the left, and when Zaknafein stoically failed to take the bait he smiled a bit. He bluffed again.

Then he did it a third time.

Zaknafein rolled his eyes. “Oh do hurry – ”

Hoping to find him distracted, the boy came at him in earnest: as quick as a serpent’s tongue. Zaknafein threw up a blade, slanting it downward to deflect the one aimed for his head, then sidestepped to let the momentum carry his opponent’s sword-point to the floor. When the boy was half turned for an instant with his ribcage unguarded, Zaknafein pivoted smoothly and aimed a kick for his kidney. The boy arched his back and twisted sharply, not quite managing to get out of the way, but escaping the full force of the blow. Zaknafein planted his feet again and threw all his body weight into an upward slash. From his awkward, evasive stance the boy couldn’t block, but he spun out of the way with surprising smoothness and in an instant he was once again facing Zaknafein squarely.

In the span of one steady breath he caught the fleeting, near-imperceptible glance that told him where his opponent would strike next. He was ready for it, poised to find his opening, sure and still and waiting when – abruptly – the boy gracelessly threw his sword pommel-first at Zaknafein’s face. He blocked it easily, but in his moment of confusion his opponent swung a punch at his nose and hooked a heel behind his. Zaknafein instinctively stepped backward to avoid the blow to his face, but stumbled and fell hard to the floor.

The air rushed from his lungs and one blade went spinning out of reach. He clung firmly to the other, but his vision blurred and he couldn’t force a single, desperate breath past his lips. His opponent planted one knee into his belly and seized his right wrist, trying to force him to release the sword. They grappled for a few moments, Zaknafein resisting valiantly but weakly in a breathless haze of pain. Finally, the other boy managed to force him over onto his stomach and twist his arm behind his back. Zaknafein stubbornly held onto the grip of his sword, but the boy gave a brutal tug and with a nauseating _pop_ pain erupted through his already injured shoulder. Almost immediately his whole arm went numb.

Unable to lift his head he panted heavily into the grit on the stone floor, only half aware of approaching footsteps.

“You are dismissed, Judomne.” The moderator’s voice was as amused as it was final. Zaknafein groaned softly as his arm was released and his opponent’s weight lifted from the small of his back. The game was over, and he was in too much pain to contest the moderator’s injustice. Distantly, he heard other students murmuring to one another as they began to leave the room.

Bitterness didn’t sink in immediately. He was still dizzy and his vision swam, but the pushed himself up onto his knees with his good hand and gingerly flexed the other.

“The joint is out of place.”

He glanced up at Jarlaxle, who was standing hesitantly just a few feet away.

Zaknafein frowned and spat a bit of dirt out of his mouth. “Has our generous moderator named you a victor?”

Jarlaxle glanced up, then took a few steps closer and offered Zaknafein a hand. He didn’t take it. Jarlaxle sighed softly. “If you had been assigned this arena at random would you be so bitter a loser?”

“If.”

Jarlaxle let his hand fall to his side, smiling wryly. “You need to push your shoulder back.”

With some difficulty Zaknafein got to his feet and gave Jarlaxle a cold look. “Why did you - ”

“Shhh, walk with me.” Urgently, he laid a firm hand on Zaknafein’s back and steered him toward the door. The young moderator watched them closely as they passed, arms crossed over his chest and his expression unreadable.

“Jarlaxle - ” as other students filed past in the arched hallway, Zaknafein pulled free of his companion’s grasp. “What is this, some kind of revenge for your damn face?” he snarled.

Jarlaxle turned to look at him, his eyebrows raised and the tip of his tongue pressed between his teeth. “I am sorry,” he said, and though he wore a hesitant smile Zaknafein was surprised to find his tone so genuine. “I bear you no ill will, I swear it, expected this to be as fair a bout as any. I only wanted to see you again.”

Zaknafein sneered. “Why?”

“Because I find you interesting.”

They stood silent for a moment, Zaknafein suspicious and Jarlaxle imploring, and as usual it was the latter who spoke first.

“Let me set your shoulder.”

Zaknafein paused. “And trust that you will not make it worse?”

Jarlaxle rested his hands on his hips and shrugged.

When Zaknafein sighed another jolt of pain coursed down his arm. He met his companion’s gaze and nodded slowly.

Jarlaxle led him to the shallow steps below the entrance of the academy and he sat heavily on the smooth-worn granite, gritting his teeth and trying not to move his upper body as he did. Jarlaxle knelt on the stair behind him, laying one hand on Zaknafein’s shoulder blade and the other on his upper arm.

“This is going to hurt.” He warned quietly.

“That is nothing new.”

“Take a deep breath, and try not to bite your tongue.”

He started to inhale, but the abrupt and devastating pain that shot through him as Jarlaxle pressed on his joint forced a scream from between his clenched teeth. Finally, he felt the bones pop back into place, and perhaps it was that slight wash of relief, but for a few nauseating seconds his vision went black. Jarlaxle quickly put an arm around his chest to stop him from sliding off the edge of the stair.

It took a few blinks for Zaknafein to fully regain his senses, but when he did he found that he could fully rotate his shoulder with fairly minimal anguish. “Thanks, I suppose,” he panted.

Jarlaxle straightened up and circled around to settle on the steps beside his companion. “The least I could do. Literally. I hardly feel as though I’ve made it up to you.”

Zaknafein smiled a little, resting his elbows carefully on his knees. “I am not entirely sure I want you in my debt. You have a strange way of returning favors.”

Jarlaxle smiled. “There’s something I want to show you.”

“Whatever it is, I assure you I am not interested.”

“Oh but you are, my friend.”

Zaknafein felt a slight squirm of discomfort at being called “friend.” He had never heard that word on the lips of someone with no ulterior motives, but just the same he felt sure that – for now, at least – Jarlaxle meant him no real harm.

“What did it cost you?”

“I beg your pardon?”

Zaknafein dug in his pocket and produced the leather packet. “This cannot have come cheap,” he said, “but bribing a lesser master to change my rotation? What did you give for that?”

Jarlaxle didn’t answer for a moment, just tapped his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Nothing of any real value.”

Zaknafein rolled his eyes a little. “Go eat the breakfast you didn’t earn. If you still care to show me this deeply interesting…” he gestured dismissively, “thing, I’m sure you will find me again when I am not in so foul a mood. By sheer coincidence, of course.”

“Of _course_ ,” Jarlaxle laughed.

Zaknafein tried to hide his smile.

* * *

 

Jarlaxle pretended not to hear the footsteps behind him until a hand closed around his arm. He turned, his eyes glinting like chips of ice.

“Ah, Vranse,” he said coolly, “I was hoping to run into you so as to hear from your own mouth why I shouldn’t gouge your pretty eyes out.”

Utterly undaunted by Jarlaxle’s venomous words, Vranse shoved the smaller drow up against the wall and grinned down at him. “You asked for Zaknafein Do’Urden. You promised payment for Zaknafein Do’Urden,” he crooned, “that’s what I gave you.”

“And then you went well out of your way to ensure that he was damaged, that is a breach of faith, Vranse.”

“I don’t want your faith.”

Jarlaxle squirmed, but Vranse pushed him roughly again. Subtly he slipped one of his bracelets into the palm of his hand; his fingers poised to twist it open if necessary.

“I have your damn scarab amulet, but I would be a fool to carry it with me on Academy grounds.”

“About that, Jarlaxle,” he bit his lip just slightly, feigning regret, “I’m afraid my terms have changed.”

“You cannot change terms after the deal is done.”

“The problem, you understand, is that you have been seeking other favors from other people, and knowing now what you are willing to pay _them –_ ” his eyes ran wolfishly down Jarlaxle’s throat – “I feel now that I have been slighted.”

He was a bit too familiar with that look. “Knowing how well you uphold your bargains, I feel much the same way.”

Vranse smiled cruelly. “I can get you anything you want, Jarlaxle, and as long as you do not cheat me, I will not cheat you.”

“Our professional relationship is over, Vranse, you saw to that today.” He pushed back, but Vranse did not release his grip.

“What is he to you?” He demanded mockingly. “That tenth-house soldier? Are you trying to sabotage him or do you want his protection?”

“I need no one else’s protection.”

“Then you’re giving yourself to him for free?” He ran a hand over Jarlaxle’s waist. “Do you come so cheap, Jarlaxle? Now that _is_ a slight.”

Jarlaxle was dumbstruck for a moment, then nearly laughed ruefully at the irony. It was too late for him to claim _not_ to be sleeping with Zaknafein now that he had caused such a spectacle with Shirreth. Hearsay was as good as fact in Melee-Magthere.

“Nothing you could offer me would be worth suffering _you_.” He gave Vranse another shove and he finally let go. Jarlaxle resentfully ran a hand through his hair and straightened out his shirt, making a good show of being unfazed but watching Vranse from the corner of his eye as he turned to leave.

“Lethrain told you no, did he not?”

Jarlaxle paused, his body heavy with resentment.

“He told me what you asked for two days ago. It’s no easy thing, but I can get it for you.”

Jarlaxle swore quietly to himself, his fingers twisting viciously at a bracelet as he weighed the value of his own pride.

“I take it,” he seethed finally, “that this is not negotiable.”

He heard Vranse take one slow step, then another, and suddenly he was far too close. Jarlaxle could feel his body heat crawling along his spine. He flinched when Vranse’s fingers curled loosely around his throat, his breath hot on Jarlaxle’s skin.

“All or nothing.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My boyfriend joked that Jarlaxle must be the hottest piece of ass in Menzoberranzan, but in a completely canon-mindful way, I think it would have been fairly common for young male drow to use sex as currency. Socially, they are very low in the pecking order and would have little else to bargain with. Rape by coercion would also be a useful tool for masters and lesser masters: it is highly demoralizing and would reinforce submissive behavior. In these cases it's not so much about genuine attraction as it is about a) convenience, and b) social politics.


	5. Abbilen Inbal Nind Kl'aen (Friends Have Their Uses)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Certain tags will become directly relevant from here on out. Also, ten points if you can pinpoint my reference to Gillen's run on Journey Into Mystery.

Zaknafein woke at the press of a cool palm over his mouth. Half-asleep and driven by instinct, he seized his assailant’s wrist, twisted his arm, and threw him onto the bunk in a deft maneuver that left the interloper neatly pinned.

Jarlaxle silenced his surprised laughter with his free hand and Zaknafein released him with a start. ‘ _What in all the hells are you doing?’_ He signed, pulling back and glancing up to make sure the flurry of movement had not woken anyone.

Jarlaxle smiled almost timidly, the glint in his eyes disarming. _‘Paying you back.’_

Zaknafein paused, frowning uncertainly. A strange hyper-awareness flitted through his body: he felt his clothes touching his skin, the way his lips set against each other, Jarlaxle’s thigh pressed against the outside of his knee as he lay flat on his back. His pulse quickened.

 _‘Come on,’_ Jarlaxle hurried to his feet and looked back at him expectantly.

Zaknafein glanced around again, knowing that any one of the other boys in the crowded barracks would report him without hesitation if he thought he could gain something by it. Still, Jarlaxle waited, one eyebrow raised and his crimson gaze daring. With a silent sigh, Zaknafein crept out of his bed and followed.

Jarlaxle moved quickly and quietly through the pyramidal complex, but somehow his stride remained as brazen as ever. Had anyone passed them – and no one did at this hour – Zaknafein was sure that Jarlaxle would not have seemed the least bit guilty or out of place. It was an extraordinary talent, one Zaknafein was sure he was not imitating well. They left Tier Breche entirely, passing down into Menzoberranzan proper, where the hive-like bazaar had bustled during the sunless daylight hours. Even the most questionable of patrons had cleared out by now: Narbondel’s glow was nothing more than a dim sliver in the distance, but Jarlaxle seemed to know exactly what he was doing.

“I suppose you’ve no intention of telling me where we are going?” He asked quietly, sticking tight on Jarlaxle’s heels.

“You suppose correctly.”

“Tell me this, at least, will my life be in danger at any point?”

Jarlaxle shrugged. “Not if you step carefully.”

Zaknafein could not recall the last time he had sighed so often at the expense of one person, but he kept pace and did not argue.

“Were you hurt in yesterday’s match?” Zaknafein asked.

“Why?” Jarlaxle’s response was jarringly immediate.

“You’re limping a bit, and perhaps more than a bit if you were not trying to hide it.”

Jarlaxle turned and walked backwards a few paces to address him, smiling jauntily. “Where are your eyes drifting that you would notice, Zak?”

He scowled. _“Zak?”_

“Has no one yet grown tired of the other three syllables? It is rather a cumbersome name.”

“Do not call me that.”

“Why not?”

“Because I asked it of you.”

Jarlaxle shrugged again. “Very well, but I shall _think_ it and there is nothing you can do to stop me.”

“To save space in your head?”

“I need room for all the things in life that are genuinely worthwhile.”

“Of which there are few, I assure you.”

There was no amusement in Jarlaxle’s face when he turned back again. “For you, perhaps.”

They had left the empty market streets behind and were approaching a rough, uninhabited section of the cavern floor. Zaknafein had never been to this part of the city before; there was simply nothing there but squat stalagmites and the occasional dim-glowing fungus, and to keep going would bring them to the edge of the Clawrift. He struggled with the urge to complain; Jarlaxle did have a habit of making him eat his words.

They stopped just a few paces from the jagged edge of the abyss and Jarlaxle began looking disconcertingly smug.

Zaknafein scowled. “If you woke me up in the middle of the night to see a dirty great hole in the ground, I warn you, pushing you into it would ease my frustration somewhat.”

Jarlaxle stifled a grin at his irritation. “In that case I regret to inform you that I _have_ brought you here to see a dirty great hole in the ground, just not _this_ dirty great hole in the ground.” Cautiously, he stepped to the very edge of the great rift, knelt down, and ran his palm along the treacherous edge until his fingers sank into the stone as if it were no more substantial than steam. He turned to appreciate Zaknafein’s bemused expression.

“As I said,” he beamed, “step carefully.”

Beneath their boots the illusory rock gave way to a steep, carved staircase: stable, but clearly unused. Dust and gravel had spilled over the edge of the rift, and only a narrow track was worn clean where Jarlaxle had walked before. Zaknafein followed him footstep for footstep. Unable to make out the stairs in the practically nonexistent light, he followed the dim heat trail on the blue-cold stone. Perhaps a hundred feet down the steps leveled out into a small ledge, and there in the wall of the crevasse was the entrance to a cavern, naturally formed but clearly widened meticulously by hand. The space beyond was as black and cold as the night sky.

With a self-satisfied flourish Jarlaxle summoned a flickering drop of faerie fire in the palm of his hand and led the way inside, smiling all the while at Zaknafein’s genuine surprise.

“What is this place?” He whispered reverently, watching the purple glow dance along the walls and low ceiling. The soft light dipped into the entrances of half a dozen adjoining tunnels as they passed, but it was impossible to see how far each passage went. “Someone else must know about it, surely.” Something snapped beneath his boot and he looked down to find a few fragments of pottery strewn across the floor.

“Someone did,” Jarlaxle agreed, “long ago.”

“And what happened to them?”

Jarlaxle’s smile was sharp in the flickering shadows. “Before this place was Menzoberranzan, who lived here, do you think? A vast cavern like this, full of water and warmth and everything we could have needed, do you think we were the first to claim it?”

“I had never considered it, to be honest.” Zaknafein said, nudging something hard with his toe. It looked like the skull of a small reptile. “The Houses of Menzoberranzan have ruled here for generations.”

“And rulers become rulers by conquest,” Jarlaxle recited, quoting a common adage. “Whoever it was who ruled here before us, I believe the last of their kind hid here for a time, before they were eradicated. After its usefulness was expended it was forgotten.”

“How did you find it?”

“It took many years for my fickle mother and her fickle goddess to decide that I might one day prove useful,” he sighed, “I had more than a child’s share of hard survival in the interim. Desperation opens our eyes…in many ways.” Jarlaxle turned down a tunnel to his left and stopped to let Zaknafein catch him up.

The short passage opened out into a small, smooth-walled cavern. Jarlaxle let the tongue of faerie fire drift toward the ceiling and in its light Zaknafein could see small stacks of books, cubbies piled neatly with trinkets and talismans, a small table and a tidy feather mattress with no frame. The still air carried the faint, pleasant scent of warm vellum.

“Not quite a kingdom, but I am still working on it.” Jarlaxle said with a smile.

Zaknafein gazed around the little room as though it were far greater than that, his eyes full of envy and admiration. “Why are you showing me this?”

Jarlaxle paused, biting his lip pensively. “Because it seems to me that you are desperate.”

Zaknafein’s jaw clenched and he swallowed thickly. “What do you presume to know about me?”

“Nothing I could not have read plainly enough on your face.”

His eyes darted evasively along the floor.

Jarlaxle rested a hand affectionately on his companion’s shoulder. “There are thirty-four rooms down here, by my count, one of them is now yours. Any of them; this one if you like – I’ll share.”

Zaknafein was so stunned by the proposition that he did not even scoff at the joke. “This is worth far more than a few bruises, Jarlaxle, do not put me in your debt.”

“For that, and for Shirreth, and for whatever else I might put you through. For that take my apologies in advance, as well.”

Zaknafein laughed weakly.

“And also because friends do such things for one another.”

He met Jarlaxle’s gaze for a moment, his eyes narrowed slightly. “Yes,” he murmured uncertainly, “I suppose they do.”

Jarlaxle seemed surprised by the response, but the smile that crept across his face was genuine and guileless. “We cannot stay long,” he warned after a moment’s hesitation, “the guards will change at quarter-light, I can only bribe so many of them.”

Zaknafein heaved a sigh but nodded grudgingly.

Jarlaxle snickered. “Oh spare me your grumbling, Zak, the stones shall not crumble to dust in our absence.”

“I asked you not to call me that.”

“Forgive me, I spoke carelessly…but then, life is full of small torments.”

“ _Small_ torments…”

“Would you prefer greater ones?” He called the faerie fire back to his hands and turned back out into the tunnel. “I am nothing if not creative.”

“Can we come back tomorrow night?” Zaknafein asked bluntly. “I feel that you have held a lure before me only to snatch it away.”

“Not tomorrow.”

“Why not?”

“I have something important to attend to.”

Zaknafein frowned. “In the middle of the night?”

“Of course, do you not know me at all?”

* * *

 

 Jarlaxle’s eyes fixed on his bloodless fingertips as his palms pressed flat on the dull metal tabletop. His breath was ragged, but he clenched his teeth to remind himself not to say anything snide. Even so, when Vranse closed a fist in Jarlaxle’s hair and forced his head back sharply, he gave a muffled growl of pain.

“Oh don’t mewl,” Vranse panted, tightening his hold on Jarlaxle’s hip and pushing him roughly into the table. “If I made this easy for you it would hardly be much of a bargain, would it?” The imperious grin on his face was so palpable that Jarlaxle was glad he couldn’t see it.

Obediently – and with any hint of sarcasm carefully disguised – he arched his back and gasped a little and pretended for all he was worth to be enjoying it.

He hated letting Vranse fuck him, hated it even slightly more than he had hated Shirreth’s narcissism and his fire fetish (at least that arrangement had been partly Jarlaxle’s idea) but it did give him a perverse sort of power. There are few things in this world that can disarm someone the way ego can, and the surest way to control someone’s ego is to let them think that they are a god among lovers.

It was a farce, of course, and Vranse himself probably knew it, but he preferred to forget, and Jarlaxle savored his small victories. For what it was worth, he had quickly memorized the layout of the masters’ quarters, and far better than that, Vranse apparently took immense pleasure in mocking him with whatever fascinating rumors were floating around about he and Zaknafein Do’Urden.

“It hardly _is_ much of a bargain,” Jarlaxle replied, wincing again as his thighs were pressed hard into the edge of the table. “I have obliged you twice already and you have given me nothing for it.”

Vranse pulled on his hair again and he couldn’t help but whimper. “You see, that’s how I know what a pitiful, wanton thing you are,” he hissed. “Any half-wit would have demanded payment upfront, and yet here you are, in spite of all your whining and your seething. They said you were smart, thirdboy – I am not convinced.”

“Give me what I asked for,” Jarlaxle hissed through his teeth, “or I can find someone who will.”

Vranse laughed faintly. “Her name is Kithaerna Do’Urden,” he whispered, his breath hot on Jarlaxle’s ear. “The Matron’s eldest daughter, a traditionalist from what I hear. Your pretty pet is lucky to have her, I wonder why he bothers with you.” Vranse could not have thought too little of his ill-gotten lover; he was through with him not a moment later, leaving Jarlaxle bruised and scowling as his breathing calmed.

“Tell me,” Jarlaxle said, as though it were an afterthought, “How many other boys are in your debt?”

“Why?” He sneered, “Do you envy them?”

“No.” Nonchalantly, he reached for the pile of clothing he’d left hurriedly on the floor. “But when they find your body I would not want to be the only suspect. I simply wondered if I should let you redress before I cut your throat.”

Vranse probably would have laughed derisively if he’d had the opportunity, but Jarlaxle ensured that he did not. The little knife split air and flesh alike as quick and silent as a fish through water. He felt the warm spray of blood on his face and chest before Vranse’s body fell to the floor with a dull, heavy sound.

Jarlaxle brushed a few warm droplets from his mouth and stumbled back against the table, his legs shaking. “I do not suffer insults well, or did no one tell you?” He winced. “I suffer coercion more poorly still, but, well…you know that now.” He ran a hand over his stinging scalp and his fingers came away wet with Vranse’s blood. The feel of it against his skin disgusted him more than a little.

He felt no sense of triumph, no vindication. As he pulled his clothes on gracelessly he thought of nothing but the dull ache, the smattering of bruises, and the lingering tang of sex and quickly cooling blood.


	6. Vel'bol dos Plynn Zhah Dossta a Ditronw (What You Take is Yours by Right)

‘ _So much for your pressing -_ ’ Zaknafein’s hands fell still as a thick, metallic scent filled his throat. His near-wakeful bleariness cleared with a nauseating jolt. ‘ _Is that your blood?_ ’

Jarlaxle shook his head, almost imperceptibly, but his fingers seemed to tremble as they moved. ‘ _I need a favor_.’

Zaknafein stiffened slightly. Everything in him feared the word ‘favor’ with a deep-rooted and hard-earned suspicion, but he hesitated only briefly before answering with a small nod.

‘ _Come with me_ ,’ he held out a hand for Zaknafein to take, ‘ _please._ ’

 

Jarlaxle was limping worse than he had been the night before, but Zaknafein was not fool enough to mention it, even after they were well beyond the oppressive stillness of the barracks. He let Jarlaxle lead him out of the Academy complex and down along the perimeter wall towards the baths. Though perplexed and more than a bit anxious he held his silence, stifling half a dozen questions that had perched impatiently behind his teeth.

He had never seen the bathhouse pavilion entirely deserted before. Without moving bodies to stir the air a solid pillar of steam billowed from the pool: yellow and orange in infrared like a huge, listless fire pouring from the stone. The glowing drifts curled around Jarlaxle’s feet as he removed a small knife from his boot and then began callously pulling off his clothes.

Zaknafein fidgeted. He tried not to let his eyes linger on the dappling of bruises along Jarlaxle’s thighs, but there was no mistaking the way the blood glowed warm beneath his skin. “What is it that you want from me exactly?” He asked.

Jarlaxle flinched slightly as he stepped into the pool. He took a few moments to rinse the blood off his face and arms before replying. “I need you to cut my hair.”

Zaknafen’s brows pulled together in confusion but the cautioning way Jarlaxle looked at him turned his curiosity bitter on his tongue. Jarlaxle offered him the little blade handle-first as though his silence were agreement enough. When he did not respond Jarlaxle smiled weakly. “You are already out of bed, you might as well.”

The stony expression on Zaknafein’s face did not falter, but slowly he undressed, stepped into the water, and took the knife uncertainly from Jarlaxle’s hand.

“How short?” He asked, testing the borrowed blade against his thumb.

Jarlaxle settled on the stone ledge and rested his elbows on the edge of the pool. “Short enough that you can’t pull it.”

Zaknafein continued to run the blade between his fingers, careful not to hold eye contact for too long. “The result may not be sterling, I have never done this before.” Ripples broke the unusually still surface of the waist-deep water, and he rested his knee on the bench near Jarlaxle’s hip. Carefully, he drew a lock of hair between his fingers, set the small knife to it and hesitated. “You are sure you would not rather do this yourself?”

“I trust you. Implicitly.”

Drawing in a slow breath Zaknafein pressed, loosing a few dozen fine strands. He followed them as they spun lazily through the air to alight on the water's surface like shards of ice. Confident now that no great catastrophe was to unfold if he continued, he gathered another short, silky lock between his fingers and sheared it off against his thumb. The corner of Jarlaxle's mouth quirked up as he watched the loosed strands flutter past his eyes.

A few long minutes passed in which the soft hiss of the blade at work and the lapping of the water on the stone were the only sounds that echoed across the high ceiling. With each soundless breath Zaknafein realized more acutely that he had never known Jarlaxle to be so quiet for so long. He had let his eyes fall closed and his shoulders go slack, and with each gentle tug on his hair his head would give a slight, insouciant bob. For all his criticism of Jarlaxle's incessant talking, Zaknafein found the charged, meditative silence crushing.

When he had made a little progress he ran his fingers through the shorn section of Jarlaxle’s hair and gave an experimental tug. Jarlaxle seemed to come back to himself quite suddenly, raising an eyebrow and smiling a little. “Not very good at this, are you?”

“I did warn you,” he sighed, quietly relieved to hear the mocking edge in his friend’s voice again.

“If you were not up to the task you could have refused.”

“If you distract me it will be you who pays for it.”

“I think you know what happens to people who take my self-obsession lightly. Focus.”

With playful spite Zaknafein gripped his hair again and pulled a bit harder. With a soft exhale Jarlaxle let his head tip back, baring his throat, and in those fleeting seconds before he was released, he grew acutely aware of his own quickening heartbeat. He laughed a bit as Zaknafein let go, but there were goose bumps down his arms.

For how mercilessly he wielded a sword, Zaknafein’s fingers were deft and gentle as he fell into a pensive pattern of cutting and carding until he could no longer find a grip. Jarlaxle let his half-focused gaze drift slowly up his friend’s toned stomach, then his chest and along his jaw. If Zaknafein noticed he paid no mind, and so Jarlaxle did not stop.

Finally, Zaknafein paused to survey his work and gave a small, satisfied sigh. “Not an utter disaster,” he decided.

Jarlaxle hummed noncommittally. “You should let me cut yours,” he offered, reaching up to work out a snarled lock that had fallen over Zaknafein's shoulder.

“And be disowned by my house? I think not.” He scowled thoughtfully and leaned in again to even out a spot near Jarlaxle’s ear.

“Are you truly afraid of punishment?” He murmured, “or would Kithaerna not want you then?”

It took only the slightest of movements for Zaknafein's hand to snap from Jarlaxle's temple to his throat and force his whole body viciously against the stone lip of the pool. Jarlaxle gasped. The grip was painful, but he could draw breath well enough, so he simply froze stock-still and gazed into his friend's fiery eyes.

“Never,” he snarled, and Jarlaxle was sure that some small measure of fear crept into that imposing visage. “ _Never_ speak of her.”

“And why is that?” Jarlaxle rasped, smirking slightly.

“I swear, I could throttle you -”

“But you will not.”

Zaknafein's teeth clenched as Jarlaxle drew another shaky breath.

“Tell me, my friend,” he struggled to keep the painful tremor out of his voice, “Why does the mere mention of her so offend you?”

“It is _you_ who offends me,” he snapped, and his grip tightened, “with your presumptions and your flippancy and your damned arrogance.”

Jarlaxle's eyes narrowed, and his sardonic smile widened. “You understand yourself so little, Zaknafein.” In the silence that followed he could feel his friend's pulse in the hand that held his throat. It was heightened, and the turmoil in his gaze was nearly tangible. Gently, he reached out to let his fingers brush Zaknafein’s thigh beneath the water, and Zaknafein flinched away as though it had burned him. “Strange, isn’t it?” Jarlaxle murmured.

“ _What_ is?” He demanded.

“That when someone rushes at you with a sword you hardly blink, but if I simply touch you, you nearly jump out of your skin.”

He scowled. “I am not afraid of you, if that’s what you think.”

“No. That you certainly are not.” Jarlaxle agreed. “Have you yet dared to refuse her? Is that why she binds you?”

His hand shook.

“No,” Jarlaxle decided immediately, “you are not half so foolish as that. She binds you because it pleases her, but you _wish_ you could refuse. So many boys would kill for what you have, yet you _hate_ her, you hate her touch. You hate the sound of her name on my lips, because it reminds you that even for how fully I distract you, you are never free of her.”

“You flatter yourself,” Zaknafein managed to snarl, his timorous grip finally loosening on his friend's throat.

“I do few things more prolifically,” he agreed, finally drawing a full breath, “and I am rarely wrong.” His fingertips climbed idly higher on Zaknafein’s thigh, and Zaknafein did a very poor job pretending not to notice.

“I could make you forget,” Jarlaxle murmured, making note of the way his friend's muscles tensed at his touch. “Oh how I could distract you…”

“ _What?_ ”

His fingers curled behind Zaknafein’s knee and pulled sharply, setting him off-balance and forcing him to stumble forward.

“No!” He gasped, bracing a hand against the edge of the pool and struggling to right himself against smooth stone and wet skin. Jarlaxle held him around the hips and pulled him tight against his chest, close enough that his mouth alighted on Zaknafein's finely muscled stomach.

“Jarlaxle...don't – ”

“Oh, but I already have,” he murmured gently, squeezing harder, pressing his short nails into Zaknafein's lower back. His pale eyelashes brushed his cheekbones as he glanced impishly downward, a smile playing at his wet, parted lips. “And what a poor liar you are.”

“Let go,” Zaknafein growled, struggling a little against Jarlaxle's confident grip.

“If you wanted me to let go,” he mused, careful to let his lips touch Zaknafein's skin with every word, “you would have used that knife.”

Zaknafein took a shuddering breath and looked down at the little blade. The shallow pattern on the handle was now etched into his dampened palm. Swallowing thickly, he loosened his grip.

“Now,” Jarlaxle nearly whispered, pulling his friend lower onto his lap, “look me in the eye and tell me, _earnestly_ , to stop, and never an indecent thought shall I spare for you again.” A slow inhale filled his lungs with Zaknafein's faint scent – warm leather and tallow soap – and Jarlaxle's tongue flicked surreptitiously over his sternum. Zaknafen's breath caught in his throat, and his grip on the stone ledge tightened.

“Tell me no,” he cooed again, letting one palm slide up the inside of Zaknafen's thigh, “tell me no and mean it.”

Zaknafein breathed deeply, opened his mouth, and touched tongue to lips but couldn't muster a word.

Jarlaxle smiled triumphantly, and his hand crept higher still.

“I don't – _ah_...” If it had been a protest, it had come too late, because the steep arch of his back and the soft _plunk_ of the knife into the water betrayed him.

He had to bite back the soft sound – partly surprise, partly something else entirely – that pleaded at his throat, resenting the unabashedly indulgent way Jarlaxle panted as he slowly palmed Zaknafein’s cock beneath the opaque heat of the water. It didn't matter. He could be as quiet as he pleased. Words lie, flesh does not. His teeth dug into his lower lip, and both hands clung to the stone edge as his heart pounded.

It made Jarlaxle feel powerful, to take Zaknafein apart so very easily. The young soldier had begun to push eagerly into Jarlaxle’s hand in spite of himself, and tense little shudders ran up his thighs as he expended ever more effort on self-restraint. Jarlaxle gave his friend's shoulder a gentle, encouraging bite and tightened his grip until Zaknafein gasped sharply, leaning forward into Jarlaxle's chest as he shuddered, fingers trembling, and every nerve in his body went live.

He didn't come as quietly as he would have hoped, much to Jarlaxle's sinister delight, but he was too overwrought to care for more than an instant.

Jarlaxle let him lean heavily against his shoulder until he caught his breath, and had the decency not to snicker until Zaknafein had pulled himself back together.

“Fuck,” he said blandly, resting back on his heels.

Jarlaxle laughed, running a hand through his inexpertly shorn hair.

Zaknafein was quiet for a moment, still quivering, still breathing erratically, and clearly struggling not to look Jarlaxle directly in the eye.

Jarlaxle smiled unassumingly. His stomach was tight with silent pleas for reciprocation, but he ignored it. That wasn't how this was going to go, he was sure. Not now, at least. He let his fingertips alight on Zaknafein's thigh once again, memorizing the temperature and texture of his skin.

Slowly, the glint left Zaknafein's eyes and his jaw clenched. With sudden resolve, he disentangled himself from his friend and stood – unsteadily – a few steps back. “She will find out,” he promised grimly, “I cannot say how, but she will.”

“A jealous lover is she? Pity. In that case, I take the whole thing back.”

“She may very well kill you,” he snarled, “and she will do far worse to me.”

“She can try,” he said casually, resting his elbows back on the lip of the pool. “I think she will find that I am very difficult to eradicate, and you? What could she do to you that she has not already done without provocation?” With a smirk Jarlaxle brought the pad of his thumb to his lips and touched it to his tongue, holding Zaknafein’s gaze all the while. A knot in Zaknafein's stomach clenched and unclenched, making him shudder right down to his fingertips. He averted his eyes. Tremulous with far more than anger, Zaknafein climbed unsteadily out of the water to get his clothes, and Jarlaxle did not stop him.

“Thank you.” Jarlaxle murmured with a startling solemnity.

Zaknafein did not acknowledge him, just finished dressing as quickly as he could and stormed off back to bed.

 

By the time he had crept back into his bunk and buried his face in his flat pillow, he felt as though the roaring in his ears would rip him apart. He was knotted up with fear and humiliation and anger, but a thread of giddy, uninvited pleasure was tangled into the mess of his head and he could not dismiss it, no matter how hard he tried to burn it out with blind rage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just want to take this opportunity to briefly address the fact that everything Jarlaxle did in this chapter is Very Not Cool in the enthusiastic consent department, and the fact that he was in a bad place emotionally does not excuse this behavior. This has been a PSA.


	7. Gaer zhah Nau Folt Klez 'zil natha Bwael Brorn (There is No Such Thing as a Good Surprise)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahaha you thought I had abandoned it didn't you? Sucker, I am neck deep in this ship, I literally cannot escape send help quickly please this is becoming dangerous.

Zaknafein did not recall falling asleep, but he dreamt vividly. He dreamt of sharp nails on his throat, of the kiss of a fanged whip on his ribs, he dreamt of a terrible, burning pain in his belly and of her voice. She whispered promises in his ear, promises he knew she would keep.

He woke abruptly at the sound of distant shouting and the commotion in the barracks that rose with it. Bleary and disoriented, his pierced ears throbbing badly, he sat up and fumbled for his boots, but in the midst of the anxious stirring all around him he paused for a moment. The hair at the nape of his neck was still damp from the bath, and the moving air roused goosebumps on his skin. He inhaled slowly, forcing himself to focus on the pain in his ears. He was accustomed to pain; it was the sweet tension lingering low in his stomach that he could not bear.

An overseer swept past his bunk. “Off your backs little grubs!” He shouted, “Gather in the Grand Arena!”

There were no complaints, no questions; no one dared even to look outwardly confused as they jostled into the narrow walkway. Zaknafein struggled to pull his boots on between hurried strides, and as he finally straightened up he found that he’d fallen into step with the ever-pensive Reas Oblodra. The boy wore a reserved, knowing expression that made Zaknafein scowl.

' _Is there something you know that the rest of us do not?_ ' He signed.

Reas gave a patronizing smile. ' _There are many such things._ '

Zaknafein rolled his eyes. ' _Anything less esoteric?_ '

' _I do not know what awaits us._ ' He admitted, ' _but I feel sure that we are being punished for something._ '

He felt a strange, inexplicable tightness in his chest. ' _For what?_ '

' _If I knew,_ ' Reas replied, ' _I would tell you._ '

The Grand Arena was large enough to accommodate the entire second-year class many times over, but as the group of boys filed into the room uncertainty held them together in a tight, cautious knot. They eyed each other suspiciously, still tired and confused and feeling even more vulnerable than usual, but fear of the unknown proved greater than their mistrust of one another. As the last few stragglers entered the room, the heavy double doors thudded closed behind them.

A shudder ran through the group as a crisp voice rang out from above them. “Well done, _dalharen_ ,” it sang out cheerily, “we are impressed.”

Zaknafein – along with every other boy in the room – turned his eyes up to the stone catwalk around the arena.

Dressed formally in silver and red, his dark eyes glinting dangerously, Jaldriren Nurbonnis smiled down at them. Though born of a house with no real prestige, he was a celebrated tactician and one of the highest-ranked masters at the academy. Most of the younger students knew him by sight: he had a reputation as a creative disciplinarian. Zaknafein’s eyes narrowed as he cursed Reas’s perceptiveness.

“One of you,” Jaldriren continued, in the same bright tone, “has proven himself very ambitious.” Here he paused for effect as each boy called to mind someone he could blame. “Mere hours ago, a lesser master was found in his quarters with his throat slit.” Zaknafein’s heart dropped into his stomach as he recalled the sharp stench of blood on Jarlaxle’s body, but his face remained as cool as glass. A gentle ripple of alarm ran through the crowd. “This lesser master in particular had been leading exercises in your year – making a few enemies, I am sure – and one of you took the initiative to remove his highly irritating presence from your lives. Well done. Well _done_. Rarely are such young students so…proactive.”

The tremors in the crowd grew ever more distrustful. Jaldriren smiled approvingly.

“To reward your exemplary behavior I have arranged a bit of fun for you all.” The group of students quickly began to widen out, as though something dangerous had already crept in amongst them while Jaldriren spoke. “It was difficult, being a last-minute task, but we had been keeping this game under wraps for a while. Saving it for a special occasion, so to speak.”

He glanced pointedly down at the floor far below. On cue, four smug-looking lesser masters entered from one of the five small doors in the opposite wall, each carrying a thick, lumpy roll of fabric. They threw the bundles into a pile on the sandy floor and a series of metallic clatters rang through the room as they struck. From the folds of the rumpled fabric protruded a number of rusty, battered swords: not sparring swords, but live, edged steel. By the look of it, there could not have been enough weapons to arm half the room. Each of the four lesser masters looked up at Jaldriren for approval before hurrying from the arena.

Every eye in the room fixed on the glinting pile of blades, but no one moved.

Jaldriren chuckled. “Have fun, boys, and play nicely.” 

Slowly, the last perimeter door creaked open and for a few tense seconds there was perfect, utter stillness. Not so much as a shuddering breath broke the charged air.

From the dense blackness of the tunnels beyond the doors Zaknafein heard the faintest of clicking sounds. He turned his head slowly to listen, careful to keep the pile of weapons well within his periphery. The clicking grew louder, more frenetic, and he felt that he could almost see motion in the darkness, though the faint heat trails drifting around the door were flat and indistinct. Finally, a few boys broke and ran for the cache at the other end of the arena. For an instant, Zaknafein considered joining them, but the sudden chorus of screeching that echoed through the arena froze his blood in his veins.

The bedlam grew rapidly until a frantic, keening host of armored, ungainly creatures clambered out of the tunnel, flailing and climbing over one another. Their hooked forelimbs knocked together rhythmically as they lumbered forward, creating a stomach-turning clicking sound. Of the group who had run for the weapons, a few halted or jumped back with a start, the rest only ran faster, determined to face the hook horrors armed.

The remaining students immediately struggled to spread out, their fear only intensified by a panicked sense of claustrophobia. Their sudden wave of movement drew the hook horrors’ attention immediately. They turned from the few sprinting opportunists and set upon the group, clapping their serrated limbs together, their glassy, near-blind eyes wide and fixed. About two dozen in all had now poured from the tunnel, beaked heads sniffing eagerly at the air.

Zaknafein found himself pushed to the edge of the arena, mercifully far from the shrieking creatures, and with most other students now focused on the enemy he turned and hurried along the perimeter wall. He had never seen a hook horror alive before and felt sure that even an edged blade would be no match for their armor, but if he was going to die he preferred to do it with steel in his hand.

Panic was taking hold, spreading from one boy to the next like a pathogen. Drow were much faster and more agile than the horrors; an individual could have evaded the monsters for hours, but no boy alone could keep an eye on so many, and the arena limited their escape routes. To make matters worse, Zaknafein was not the only one who had made a late break for the weapons, and the obvious student-to-blade ratio complicated the matter of who was ally and who was aggressor.

By the time he had crossed the arena, a cluster of students had already begun viciously grappling with each other to get at the cache. The few who had come away with sword in hand were watching their classmates with nearly as much apprehension as they watched the horrors. The creatures, meanwhile, had begun working to pick off individuals, surrounding or cornering them, and few of the young drow could fight back. 

As Zaknafein stood clear of the fray and considered his options, one of the horrors barreled into the tangle of boys struggling to get at the weapons, unperturbed by the mess of blades beneath its clawed feet. The boys scattered immediately, but not all of them ran quickly enough. The horror sank it’s heavy beak into one young drow’s shoulder, dragged the boy closer, and crushed him into a grisly embrace. The serrated hooks tore deep into his stomach and his shriek of agony echoed through the arena.

Zaknafein did not allow himself a moment of shock; he dove forward and slid in the sand at the creature’s feet. A sword pommel glinted slightly in the dimness, nearly hidden by one of the discarded rolls of fabric. He reached out for it, steady-handed and focused, only to collide painfully with another body.

He regained his feet in a heartbeat, but the sight of Jarlaxle immobilized him for far longer. The smaller boy met his gaze, then looked quickly from the sword to the momentarily distracted horror. He seized Zaknafein’s shoulder first, then the sword, and dragged both of them clear of the creature’s reach. Both boys stumbled back a few steps before Zaknafein pulled free of Jarlaxle’s grasp and shoved him roughly away.

“If you ever touch me again,” he panted, “I will kill you.”

Jarlaxle looked perplexed. “You’re welcome?”

Another of the horrors fixed them in its dead gaze and trundled forward, hooks snapping eerily. Jarlaxle neatened his stance and faced it. “My, you are an unfortunate-looking creature.” He mumbled to himself.

Zaknafein, still unarmed, took a few hurried steps back.

The horror lashed out brutally but clumsily, and Jarlaxle ducked beneath its claws. He struck a solid blow to the horror’s underside, but the sword bounced harmlessly off its armored plates. Jarlaxle rolled quickly out of range, stood quickly and backed up.

“Give me the sword.” Zaknafein demanded.

“I seem to recall that you have recently threatened me.” Jarlaxle replied, struggling to keep out of the hooks’ considerable range.

Zaknafein gritted his teeth against the sudden rush of anger that filled his throat. Rashly, tactlessly, he threw his whole body weight against Jarlaxle’s shoulder, bearing him to the ground with a sharp gasp of surprise and pain. The rogue would never have let go of he blade had he not been so thoroughly blindsided, but in the moment of confusion Zaknafein managed to wrest it from his grip.

Zaknafein leapt to his feet just as the creature came bearing down on him, and thanks more to ferocity and luck than cleverness, he turned on the spot and plunged the blade smoothly into the joint beneath the horror’s forelimb. It screeched once, stretching out weakly with its claws, then fell forward into the sand. Breathing heavily, Zaknafein jerked the blade free and staggered back a few steps. Before he could steady himself, he felt a firm hand grip his forearm.

Zaknafein turned abruptly, and every bit of his momentum carried through into the tight-clenched fist that slammed into Jarlaxle’s jaw. The smaller boy reeled and nearly fell, but Zaknafein seized the front of his shirt and shoved him against the wall. Jarlaxle’s head tipped back; his breath came in short, labored pants. Dazedly, he touched the tip of his tongue to his lip and tasted blood.

“Is this the thanks I get for doing you a little favor?” He mumbled, trying at humor but unable to muster the levity.

“Do not _dare_ speak to me like that!” Zaknafein roared, his voice cracking slightly, “who did you have to fuck, you cur? What was the price for my humiliation? I hope your informant got what he paid for, though it seems your dignity is worth very little.”

Though he was visibly disoriented, Jarlaxle’s brows furrowed with genuine concern. “Have I so deeply affected you, Zaknafein?” He grunted in pain as he was pushed roughly against the wall again.

“Does it please you, this game of yours?” Zaknafein snarled venomously, “to pick people apart and toy with what you find?”

He laughed dryly, humorlessly. “You say ‘people’ as though I have gone to such effort for others.”

“You will give yourself without protest to any fool with a song to sing!”

Jarlaxle gave another sharp, incredulous laugh. “And if that were true, what does it matter to you?”

If Zaknafein had had an answer, he was robbed of the chance to give it. He released Jarlaxle and spun just in time to deflect a staggering blow from a pair of razor-sharp claws. The shock burned through his half-healed shoulder and the recoil pushed him backward. Unable to get his feet beneath him, he stumbled and fell into Jarlaxle, losing his grip on the sword and dragging both of them to the ground. Just above them the horror’s claws raked the granite wall with a sickening scrape.

The creature took a step back and clicked its beak in confusion a few times turning its head back and forth all the while. It resumed steadily tapping its claws together.

In the tumble, Zaknafein’s hand had landed against Jarlaxle’s stomach, and with the tiniest movements he could manage, he signed ' _don’t move_.' He felt Jarlaxle’s breath stop as they both watched the horror search blindly for them, unable to echolocate properly so close to the rough-cut wall. It puzzled over its lost meal, stretching out with its claws and sniffing, but there was already blood in the air, and the scent of drow was everywhere. Slowly, it turned its head and stepped back, pinpointing another young drow without difficulty and lumbering off in pursuit.

Zaknafein felt the air fill Jarlaxle’s chest and his muscles relax.

“I am sorry.”

Zaknafein glanced down at him wordlessly. Though he was still shaking slightly his rage quickly sputtered and drowned in its own fuel.

“I’m sorry,” Jarlaxle repeated, “I should never have done that to you, and moreover I should never have delved into your life as I did.”

Slowly, Zaknafein dragged himself off Jarlaxle and got to his feet, stooping to pick up the sword as he did. “Do not speak to me again,” he murmured solemnly, “I have no need of a friend such as you.”

* * *

Above the the arena Jaldriren watched bemusedly as the young soldier threw himself back into the fray, his movements now calculating but cold and disinterested. His battered companion was still for a long while, watching the chaos with a strange calmness.

He called to one of the lesser masters behind him. “I know Jarlaxle Baenre well enough, but who is his friend there?” He asked.

“Zaknafein Do’Urden,” came the reply, “a commoner, but an exceptional one. The two may or may not be fucking, it would depend on who you asked.”

Jaldriren chuckled. “A lovers’ spat, how sweet.”

The lesser master glanced down into the arena for a moment. “I can see that it is stopped.”

“Oh, that will not be necessary. Encourage them, in fact, but watch them closely. I am interested to see what Jarlaxle does with his companions.”

The lesser master snickered. “We know what he did with the last one.”

“You know better than to speak accusations against one of the first house without irrefutable proof, thirdboy or no.”

“Of course, Master.”

Interest turned coolly into amusement in Jaldriren’s eyes. “Though his Do’Urden boy seems more likely to kill him.”


	8. Iglatan Ph'morfel ulu tlu T'larryo (Promises are Made to be Broken)

Zaknafein stared up at the ceiling and listened to the slow breathing in the bunks around him. He felt numb – disconnected, as though his skin had crystalized and he was trapped within it, looking out into the world with a layer of ice between himself and anything that might come too close. His thoughts were still as well, carefully so: sleepless but paralyzed. It was easier this way, easier to feel nothing than to leave himself exposed.

Narbondel’s light had reached its nadir and not yet begun to climb again when the pain started in Zaknafein’s head. He managed to pretend for a moment that it was a late-blooming souvenir of his harrowing fight with the horrors that morning, but he knew better. It grew stronger, and with it came a compulsion, a wordless but fierce drive. _You are mine_ , it seemed to whisper.

The ice cracked, fractured, opened gaping fissures.

 _She knows_. He felt sick, his heart pushed up into his throat and he had difficulty breathing. _Somehow she knows._ Slowly, he brought his hands up to cover his face, fingertips pressing into his forehead as though he could crush the silent call out of his skull. The next burst of pain made him shudder.

Silently, he rolled onto his belly and slid one hand into a small hole in the lining of his pillow. He rummaged around in the coarse stuffing until his hands closed around something small and jagged. He held the talisman tight in his fist as he climbed out of bed and crept through the barracks, the pain in his head lessening a little with each complicit step he took. The walk to the Do’Urden complex was long and familiar, but the dread did not diminish with repetition. He took every step like a man to the gallows. A few days ago he could not have imagined a fear more profound than that which he already felt for Kithaerna Do’Urden. Now he knew better. Now his treacherous mind was buzzing with Jarlaxle, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He had to stop once, near a stalagmite just beyond the plateau of Tier Breche, to double over and retch up the meager remnants of his last meal. He leaned heavily on the cool stone to let the convulsions in his stomach subside, but the call in his head berated him for the delay, urging him onward, forcing him to clench his teeth. He obeyed.

The talisman he’d been given bore a glyph that dispelled the wards around House Do’Urden’s central gate. He did not have to explain himself to the guards; everyone in the rotation knew him on sight by now, and most had guessed the reason for his evening visits. Both of the males on duty watched him closely as he passed, and it took him a moment to realize that it was envy that smoldered in their eyes. He wondered if they really knew what it was that they envied; he wondered – not for the first time – if Kithaerna was truly vile or if there was simply something wrong with him.

 _So many boys would kill for what you have_ , Jarlaxle had told him. The damning thought dredged up the very tangle of memories he had worked so hard to suppress. He was so preoccupied trying to re-bury them that he did not notice the slender figure approaching him in the hallway until she was just a few feet away.

“Malice?” He asked with a start, remembering belatedly to bow in deference to the matron’s younger daughter.

She noticed his lapse in decorum, of course, but she smiled just the same. She was only a few years Kithaerna’s junior, and though there was a certain family resemblance between the two, Malice was smaller of frame, quieter, and by all accounts much more subtle.

“It has been a tenday or more since last I saw you, Zaknafein,” she remarked.

Uncertain of what game she might be playing he hesitated for a moment. “I come when I am called,” he said simply.

Malice’s smile broadened. “So you do. Come along then, I will lead you upstairs.”

He could not enter the upper levels on his own; they were reserved for nobles and other house elite. Kithaerna usually sent one of her personal guard to meet him, and twice she had sent her youngest brother, but Zaknafein did not know what to make of Malice. She laid a hand almost affectionately on the small of his back as she levitated them up to a balcony along the second level and led on. He followed at a cautious, respectful distance, but she did not speak to him again until they were nearly outside Kithaerna’s door.

“You know, if you pretend to like it,” Malice said quietly, “she may not hit you so hard.”

He said nothing, but he could feel a muscle beneath his eye twitching.

“Farewell, Zaknafein,” she added with a smile, touching his shoulder gently as she turned to leave. “Try not to make so much noise this time, would you?”

Zaknafein had gone ashen. He spent the better part of a minute standing at the door, once again slightly nauseous with dread. Malice’s unexpected presence had distracted him for a moment, but there was no respite now: he was here, and the renewed jolts of pain in his skull reminded him of his lover’s impatience. He pressed down the door handle and stepped into the small, lavish anteroom where he mechanically removed his boots and pulled out the leather cord he had used to tie back his hair. He kept his eyes downcast as he moved through the room and pushed open the inner door.

Kithaerna kept a small cage of faerie fire hanging from her ceiling like a chandelier. The light it threw was dim and cool but more than enough for drow eyes to see by. This was her intent, clearly. She waited for him in an ornate, padded armchair, her loose silk dress so diaphanous that he could see through it, an effect that would have been somewhat lost in infrared. A scaled, many-headed whip hung coiled from one arm of the chair.

“You were in no hurry, I see, sweet boy,” she lilted, leaning forward and cupping her delicate chin in her palm.

“I am sorry to have displeased you, mistress.” He glanced up but did not meet her eyes. He knew that she expected him to stare at her – the gown was no accident – but he couldn’t quite bring himself to do it.

She smiled and stood gracefully, her bare feet silent on the carpeted floor as she approached him. He kept his gaze low, hoping she would see it as submission rather than guilt.

“I pity you, Zaknafein,” she whispered, running her fingers tenderly through his hair. “There is never a spark of life in you except when I wake it.”

He swallowed thickly.

“How long as it been since I called you last?” she sighed, toying with his still-painful ear until he flinched visibly. “More than a tenday, almost two, I think. Are you not desperate yet?”

Something about the smoothness of her voice made the pit of his stomach tighten painfully, but still he said nothing.

She smiled, and her fingertips traced his lower lip. “On your knees.”

He did as he was told, and she stood at his back, touching his throat and running her thumbs along his jaw. “What did you do without me to indulge you for so long, _ussta lince’sa_?” She whispered.

Zaknafein felt faint, but he neither moved nor spoke until her nails dug into the soft flesh beneath his chin and forced his head back.

“You will answer me when I ask, Zaknafein.”

His breath was shallow, his voice pleading. “I did nothing, mistress.” Strictly speaking, it was true.

She laughed softly, and her nails cut deep enough to draw blood. “I believe you,” she said, “I believe, at least, that you fear enough what I would do to you if you disobeyed me.”

The wash of relief that came over him was so strong that for a moment he felt dizzy. He nearly forgot the blood creeping down his neck.

“But just the same, I find it wise to remind you from time to time,” she added wickedly, “lest your thoughts should wander. Lest you should forget.” Her grip on his jaw lessened, but an icy tremble rose in Zaknafein’s belly and began to spread to his extremities.

 

It was a matter of simple conditioning: give pleasure only as a brief reprieve from pain and soon enough, pain is all it takes. Soon enough, the body can hardly tell one endorphin rush from the other, even after losing blood, even when barely conscious. It had followed much the same pattern for three months, and Zaknafein was now so talented at suffering that the taste of his own blood in his mouth would usually have him hard in seconds. A whip would do the job just as well, or a hard slap to the face, or even the slow, cramping ache in his shoulders when his hands were bound behind his back. It was only after she grew bored with idle torment that she would have her way with him, and sordid though it had seemed his body had always answered her.

Now, however, as he lay with his temple pressed into the floor, he felt the bonds around his wrists fall away and realized that all he felt was pain: burning, resentful, unambiguous pain and nothing more. Finally, it seemed, his abused body had done what he had never dared to do: refuse. He lay flat on his stomach and his heart hammered against his ribs. What fresh hell would she unleash on him now that she couldn’t fuck him?

She ordered him to her bed. He moved to stand, but feigned a spell of dizziness and slumped back onto the rug. He wasn’t sure what he meant to do by buying time. He had never been further from arousal and she certainly wasn’t going to coddle him until she got what she wanted. He just wasn’t eager to be struck again, he supposed.

 _They say boys would kill for this?_ He thought bitterly, _let them have it._

Only there was no “they.” It was Jarlaxle who had told him that, whispered it softly in his ear as he had promised to help Zaknafein forget...

Kithaerna kicked him in the ribs hard enough to force him onto his side and dragged him to his feet by his belt. He let her push him down onto the mattress and he stared dazedly up at the ceiling rather than watch her undress.

He was still for a moment, his head brimming with the scent of blood and the ringing in his ears, but this time when memories came unbidden he didn’t fight them. He felt the soft pressure of Jarlaxle’s mouth on his shoulder as acutely as he had felt it when it had been real. For a few heartbeats he let his eyes fall closed and that touch was everything he knew: his skin warmed as the thought sent sweet jolts through his stomach: the wet, warm brush of Jarlaxle's tongue, the softness of his lips on Zaknafein's stomach, the deft, eager touches.

Finally his blood quickened, his breath came slow and shaky, and he forgot himself in the haze of half-imagined musings. In that moment he would have suffered everything Kithaerna had ever done to him and more to know the silken heat of Jarlaxle’s mouth.

He was torn from his reverie by the weight of her straddling his waist, a wanton smile playing over her lips, but even his hatred of her could not quite quell the desire he had fueled. His hips pushed upward eagerly, chasing the ghost of a sensation, and he no longer cared if she knew that it was not meant for her. 

* * *

“His absence has been noted,” Rhyl’lochar announced, “by the masters as well as other students.”

Jarlaxle scowled as he and his informant circled each other, pretending to spar as they spoke. Rhyl’lochar was a bit less talented at multitasking than Jarlaxle, and his attacks were not especially convincing but the boy was more reliable than most, which was a quality that Jarlaxle appreciated. “You do not happen to know anyone in Daermon N’a’shezbaernon, do you?” He asked, parrying a lackluster jab, “anyone dissatisfied with his position and looking to sell out, ideally?”

Rhyl’lochar rolled his eyes in disbelief. “No such luck, I’m afraid.”

Jarlaxle chewed the inside of his lip and glanced up to make sure the moderator was not paying them too much attention.

“Do me a little favor,” Jarlaxle said decisively, stepping in close to make sure no one could overhear, “beat me soundly, but make it look like a lucky hit, if you would. I have a reputation to uphold.”

Rhyl’lochar looked confused, but Jarlaxle gave him an opening and he took it, striking Jarlaxle’s thigh with his blade hard enough to make him shout indignantly. The moderator looked up, met Jarlaxle’s eyes, and gave the hand sign to indicate that he was dismissed. Jarlaxle gave a good show of being hurt and angry, but he shot Rhyl’lochar a sly wink as he left the small arena.

Jarlaxle walked with a little more urgency than was prudent for discretion, but he had a limited window of time and nothing besides intuition to go on. Mindful of who glanced at him as he passed, he took the most roundabout path he knew out of the Academy and toward the Clawrift.

* * *

Zaknafein lay as still as he could, but even against the soft feather mattress simply breathing made his bruised ribs ache. In spite of his exhaustion part of him regretted coming here. The ticking smelled distinct and familiar in a way that somehow both comforted him and filled him with guilt. He remained motionless for hours in the warm, quiet darkness, dwelling for far too long on his own convoluted heart before he heard the distant tap of boots on the stone corridor. He did not get up. He didn’t have to.

“In spite of all your melancholy,” Jarlaxle’s voice was a low murmur, but Zaknafein heard it as plainly as his own thoughts, “you must have known that sooner or later I might come here.” He paused uncertainly. “Shall I leave you to it, then?”

Zaknafein clenched his teeth and watched the almost invisible heat trails shift and undulate on the cavern wall. His silence persisted until he heard Jarlaxle’s boots scrape the dusty floor.

“No.” He felt a stab of humiliation at the way his voice cracked. “You can stay.”

Jarlaxle hesitated, but after a moment the sound of his footsteps drew closer. Zaknafein could feel the faint heat off his body as he sat on the edge of the small mattress. His distance was decent, Zaknafein thought, respectful. He couldn’t say why exactly, but the notion stirred an upwelling of anger in his stomach.

“Do you enjoy it?” He murmured.

“Do I enjoy what?”

“What you trade so easily for your whispers and your favors,” Zaknafein said, more venomously than he had intended.

Jarlaxle drew a breath, but seemed to spend a moment reconsidering his answer. For a long while he did not reply. “We were born worthless, you and I,” he said finally. “Both of us male, you a commoner, I the third son. We breathe, we exist only on the terms by which we are useful to those above us: to be tools, to be playthings, warm bodies, cat’s-paws. Most in our position accept this; I do not blame them. It is easy to be used…in much the same way it is easier to drown than to swim.” When he paused Zaknafein heard his breath catch slightly. “No, I do not _enjoy_ it. I hate it still more now that I give it willingly, for at least when it was taken by force I could pity myself, but when I learned – and I learned it very young, Zaknafein – that there were purposes for which I had value…I could not bear that whatever pittance my body was worth was not my own. If I am to be nothing but a plaything, so be it, but I will not be worthless. What I am is mine. I give it on _my_ terms, to whom _I_ choose, and for whatever price _I_ deem worthy.”

He spoke with such conviction that Zaknafein expected him to stand and leave, but he did not. He stayed as he was, perched uncomfortably on the edge of his own bed, his every breath audible in the still air.

“What was I worth to you?” Zaknafein asked softly. “What is it that you wanted when you touched me?”

Jarlaxle smiled wistfully. “I wanted the heat of your skin,” he whispered, “I wanted the taste of you and the soft sounds you made in rapture. I wanted more than that, if I am to be honest, but with or without I am content, Zaknafein.” This time he did move to leave, and Zaknafein could not find his voice to tell him otherwise.

“You told me not to speak to you again,” Jarlaxle reminded him, “and so I shall not, not unless you ask. Also, I promised you this room if you wanted it, and so you may remain here undisturbed, but if you should have need of me...” He did not finish his sentence, just turned abruptly and left Zaknafein alone in the dark once again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was 500% harder than usual for me, because a) I lost my flash drive, so most of what I had written initially was unretrievable and I tried to re-create it under the constant fear that my second version was not as good, and b) I'm gay as fuck, so writing het scenes is hard enough, writing het rape scenes doubly so. I know it's lacking in detail and I apologize.


	9. Malar xor El (Fight or Die)

Jarlaxle took a long, steady inhale, counted the seconds as he held it in his chest, and let it roll past his lips as slowly as he could bear. There was a wall at his back. The curved paths of the labyrinth had tricked him into a blind dead end and he did not trust the charged near-silence that hovered over both of the adjacent corridors. He stayed determinedly where he was, weapons drawn, and waited.

Ordinarily he would not have been set to run the Crucible for another month at least, but four boys had been killed in the arena with the hook horrors and the rosters had been changed. The overseer who had provided him with that flimsy explanation had smiled wickedly at Jarlaxle’s obvious disbelief.

He was playing against a stacked deck, and not by any unlucky twist of fate. The walls of the labyrinth were a good six hands higher now, too high for him to climb as he’d done once before, and the three opponents he had encountered so far were among the top in his year. He had no doubt that the other six were similarly cherry-picked for their skill. Jarlaxle was fairly confident that he could beat most of them one-on-one, but if he met several in rapid succession he would tire and slip up eventually. If he met two at once he liked his odds even less.

He kept his eyes and keen ears trained on the left-hand corridor. That was the direction he had come from, and as he had passed through it he had narrowly avoided a cunningly laid tripwire. He could not be sure, but his instinct screamed that opponents lurked in both directions, waiting for him to make a move. Rather than fighting both, he hoped to let the trap immobilize one, and perhaps provide a momentary distraction for the other, but if he _was_ being stalked, his opponents were cautious.

Impatiently, he took a silent step toward the wall and scraped the crosspiece of his knife loudly against the stone, his eyes focused straight ahead all the while. To his relief, the lurker on the left took the bait. He heard the boy take a few steps forward to investigate the sound and – just as Jarlaxle had suspected – stepped beautifully into the trap; the telltale whistling of drugged darts and his shout of surprise were like music. His movement prompted the boy on the right to burst into motion as well, but this one rounded the corner so focused on Jarlaxle that he hardly seemed to notice the first boy’s plight.

Jarlaxle shifted his weight onto the balls of his feet and bent his knees a little, but didn’t give an inch of ground. The boy – of House Duskryn, though Jarlaxle didn’t recall his given name – approached with a steady, fearless gait, a sword in each hand. Without a moment’s hesitation he attacked like a battering ram, his whole weight behind a vicious downward slash with both blades. It was a brash move, and with more room to maneuver Jarlaxle could easily have stepped aside and struck at his ribs, but the boy was no fool, he was playing the obstacles to his advantage. Jarlaxle’s first instinct was to step back, but with the wall just a few paces behind he couldn’t risk it. He threw one blade to the floor, set the heel of his hand against the flat of the other and leaned hard into a block instead, growling through gritted teeth as the shock rattled down his forearms. He was close enough to kick out hard at his opponent’s thigh, but the boy accepted the hit with a determined grunt and shoved the locked blades forward. With his footing compromised Jarlaxle had no choice but to take a precious step back and fall fully on the defensive.

The Duskryn boy – taller and at least twenty pounds heavier than Jarlaxle – continued doggedly with his cornering tactic, willing to take blow after painful blow with impressive stamina, leaving off his pressing assault only to turn away the strikes that would have counted as fatal. In spite of his superior speed and dexterity Jarlaxle was forced slowly back until his leading foot bumped the wall. He locked eyes with his opponent for an instant; saw the flicker of victory in the blackness beyond the boy’s wide pupils.

Jarlaxle deflected one last bone-shaking slash and braced himself. The Duskryn boy opened his arms and brought a blade swinging in from either side. Out of places to go, Jarlaxle dropped into a crouch, ducking his head so low that he had to throw out his hands to stop his chin from hitting the floor. The blades whisked above him, stirring his hair, and before his opponent could reposition for another strike, Jarlaxle burst into motion, leapt straight up, planted the sole of one boot just above his opponent’s bent knee, and used the extra step to vault himself up to the top edge of the wall. Even with the barrier’s added height he made it, managing to cling on by the very tips of his fingers. He struggled to bend his elbows and pull himself up before the Duskryn boy could reorient, but his arms burned with fatigue from blocking the fierce strikes, and the blade he still held in his left hand hindered his grip.

Given a few more seconds he would have made it, but drow do not live long on borrowed seconds. Before Jarlaxle could pull his chin to the lip of the wall, the Duskryn boy reached up and slammed his dull blade into Jarlaxle’s lower back.

He gave a strained roar of pain. Specks swam through his vision and in his distraction he finally lost his grip. He had neither the space nor the wherewithal to fall properly, taking the shock hard all the way up his legs, but he didn’t have to bear the pain long; unable to stop his momentum, he struck the back of his head hard on the stone floor. 

* * *

There was a candle burning.

He smelled the warm, faint tinge of smoke before his vision returned but he thought nothing of it at first; what consumed him was the pounding pain in his back and down his legs. It was worst in his right foot, and if the unbearable tightness of his boot was any indication he had likely broken something. He tried to shift his weight, find a more comfortable position, but moving only made it worse. He realized slowly that he was propped up in a chair, and when he opened his eyes to the flickering light he glimpsed all the trappings of a small office, plastered nearly everywhere with maps and diagrams. Even the tiny candle flame was disorienting to his sensitive eyes, and for a moment he had difficulty distinguishing the features of the drow standing across from him.

“Here,” a familiar voice cooed, and something cool and smooth tapped his hand. He glanced down and, after a moment of hesitation, accepted the glass. Slowly, his eyes adjusted well enough to see the dark liquid that sloshed back and forth as he tilted the small goblet. He looked up again uncertainly.

Jaldriren Nurbonnis smiled down at him, his eyes cold and an identical glass in his own hand. “Go on,” the tactician urged, his smile widening, “it’ll take the edge off.”

Haltingly, Jarlaxle brought the glass to his lips and took a sip. He nearly choked. It was at once the sweetest and bitterest thing he’d ever tasted, it burned the right side of his tongue, where he must have bitten it in the fall, and stung his throat. He was careful to mask his surprise as best he could, but Jaldriren laughed.

“Elven wine is hard to get down here, you know,” he announced, as though for Jarlaxle’s benefit, “we cannot make anything quite like it without sunlight.”

Jarlaxle swept his bloodied tongue around the inside of his mouth and took another pointed swallow. Though the second mouthful was much less jarring than the first, he couldn’t say he understood the appeal. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” He mumbled, the sarcasm plain in his voice.

“You know, I never did like Vranse,” Jaldriren mused, “he thought very highly of himself.”

“Who?” Jarlaxle asked airily, looking Jaldriren dead in the eye over the rim of his glass.

Jaldriren smiled approvingly. “You are clever, thirdboy” he granted, “and resourceful, but you go on playing this game of yours with broomsticks against opponents who have blades. You will misstep – very soon, I imagine – and when you do you will not live long to muse on your foolishness.”

Jarlaxle raised an eyebrow. “Begging your pardon, master,” he replied at length, “but if the alternative is to fight blades with bare hands, I prefer the stick.”

“The alternative,” Jaldriren corrected, “is to befriend those who are armed, not challenge them.”

Jarlaxle sighed and drained what was left in his glass. “Are you offering such advice as a condition of your _friendship_?” He smiled mirthlessly.

Jaldriren sneered down at him. “Boy, you cannot whore your way into everyone’s favor.”

“Then tell me what it is you want. Charming though your compliments are, this chair is rather uncomfortable.” It was a fight to keep up his bravado, the pain was making him slightly sick.

“Where is Zaknafein Do’Urden?” Jaldriren asked.

“Where did you leave him last?” Jarlaxle replied coolly.

The tactician laughed softly. “I can make this so much worse for you, Jarlaxle,” he promised. “Me, I care very little what you do with the boys who cheat you, but to Matron Vartha seems to think that this soldier of hers represents a significant asset. She is somewhat invested in him, and he has now been missing for two days. Now, you can walk out of here – ” he reached into his pocket and produced a small stoneware bottle, setting it on the desk with a sharp _tap_. “Or you can crawl.”

Jarlaxle looked from Jaldriren to the healing potion, feigning amusement. “You really think I am so invested in this?” He laughed weakly, “I could outright admit to killing that commoner and what of it? His matron would not dare move against me. The lowest Baenre is still a Baenre, and you may find it unwise to antagonize me so for the sake of a lower House.”

“A Baenre _boy_ ,” Jaldriren reminded him, “is worth little more to his matron than livestock.”

“Indeed, and if Vartha Do’Urden had the nerve to poach a damn rothé from under Matron Baenre’s nose, she would not suffer even that affront. You have no cause to threaten me, and even if you did, what cause would I have to keep some glorified soldier from you?” Jarlaxle felt faintly dizzy. Unfamiliar with the effects of alcohol – a rare commodity in the Underdark – he began to fear that his injuries were even worse than he realized.

“Because you are protecting him,” Jaldriren inferred smoothly.

Jarlaxle rolled his eyes, fighting the swimming sensation in his head. “To what _end_?”

“These are not questions I need answered,” Jaldriren purred, “Your personal priorities mean nothing to me. All that matters to me is that Vartha Do’Urden bears me no ill will. Do we understand one another, thirdboy?”

Jarlaxle realized that there was little he could say without incriminating himself, so he simply smiled and replied, “With _perfect_ clarity, master.” Clenching his jaw but keeping his eyes as cool as marble, Jarlaxle gripped the arms of the chair and pushed himself upright. His broken foot and the small of his back screamed and raged with pain, but by incredible force of will he took a few even steps toward the door. Jaldriren watched carefully, mildly impressed, but didn’t stop him.

“Should you find the boy,” Jarlaxle added, pulling open Jaldriren’s door and glancing back, “do let me know.”

Jaldriren laughed.

 

Jarlaxle made it to the end of the corridor with a straight spine and a slow, nearly perfect gait, but as soon as he turned a corner into an adjacent hallway he let himself collapse against the wall and slide gracelessly to the floor. He bit into the heel of his hand to stifle his breathless sobs as tears ran down his face.

Students with serious injuries were usually taken across the plateau to Sorcere, where the mages-in-training could practice their healing. Nobles were sometimes allowed to be treated by the wizards or priestesses of their own House rather than take their chances with inexperienced magic-users, but Jarlaxle had neither option. The Baenre complex was miles away and he couldn’t stagger into Sorcere without a master’s protection and expect a favor on goodwill. Even if he had something to bargain with, Jaldriren would have no difficulty ensuring that he was dragged back to face a more serious inquisition.

_He did not stop me because he knew I had nowhere to go._ Jarlaxle thought bitterly, reaching out with slightly numb fingers to rip out the laces on his right boot. It didn’t help. He could feel every stitch in the leather pressed into his flesh like a nail. He drew in a shaking breath through his teeth.

In his little warren in the Clawrift he had managed to stash away two and a half doses of fairly weak but viable healing potions. With enough time and determination he could have made the half-mile walk to the crevasse, but certainly not unseen, and even if Zaknafein was no longer there, he could not reveal his most valuable secret. He let his eyes fall closed for a moment and considered his options. Sorcere was far too obvious and he had no allies there, his two older brothers had graduated before he had entered the Academy. A few boys at Melee-Magthere would likely have connections he could take advantage of, but they would come at a high price, and he could not risk showing his current weakness openly in Melee-Magthere proper. He had made too many enemies.

He leaned his head resignedly against the wall. Less than two hundred yards from the north wall of Melee-Magthere lay the dramatic and imposing structure of Arach-Tinilith. His sister Quenthel was in her ninth year there and though she would not likely offer him any help, he could at least name-drop his way in under some pretense or other. Being indebted to a priestess was a volatile position, but he had long since decided that he would give nothing to Jaldriren, both for Zaknafein’s sake and for his own pride.

With a soft cry that even he could not manage to silence completely, Jarlaxle pulled himself up and inched his way down the corridor, leaning heavily against the wall and trying not to dwell on just how true Jaldriren’s words had been.

He played a dangerous game.


	10. Khaless orn Morfeth Natha Wael De'dos (Trust Will Make a Fool of You)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternately Titled: "Dude, Please Chill Out, It was Just a Handjob."

Zaknafein had never known sleep as sound as that which he found in Jarlaxle’s bed. The cavern was cool and silent – truly silent, free of the constant, stifling low-level shuffling and breathing in the barracks – and everything smelled clean and pleasant and gently worn. Each time he drifted slowly into wakefulness he would breathe a sigh into the pillow, faintly reminded of a time, years ago, when he had run his fingers through a sack of dried cloves in the Bazaar; the warm, rich scent had clung to his palm and mingled with the scent of his skin.

He rolled over blearily and stretched out his shoulders. He had no way of knowing how much time had truly passed. The bruises were still fresh, the lacerations only starting to mend, but in spite of the reminders of his recent torment, the memory itself felt strangely distant. He had isolated himself, stepped out of his own fear, and although he knew full well that he was no safer here than he had been at the Academy, he accepted the solace for what it was.

Slowly, he climbed off the mattress and combed his fingers through his knotted hair. He was hungry to the point of discomfort now, and this forced him to consider what he would do once he had to leave his self-imposed isolation. He was a deserter now, technically, and though returning to the Academy of his own volition would likely reduce his punishment somewhat, desertion was a crime with brutal recourse.

Not eager to dwell on the inevitable, he crossed the room and idly ran his hand along the wall until he encountered one of the many carved-out hollows. The items stacked on the shelf were the same temperature as the stone around them, making them nearly invisible. He reached out carefully and picked up something that turned out to be a small bottle. He turned it over and over until the heat from his hands turned it a faint green, then set it down again. He identified several items this way: an hourglass, a thick bundle of papers, a flat chip of obsidian on a length of sinew. After a few experiments his hand brushed a roll of vellum. Running his thumb along the edge he felt where a neat square had been cut from the larger piece. He smirked.

The sound of soft, uneven footsteps echoed in the tunnel outside. A jolt of panic shot through Zaknafein’s chest, a dread-laden certainty that somehow he’d been found out or betrayed. He took a reflexive step back from the cavern’s entrance, knocking into the small table in his distraction and clenching his fists, but his alarm settled into mild confusion when a battered-looking Jarlaxle stumbled into the room.

“So I lied,” he said breathlessly, “I said I would not disturb you and I lied. I do that.” He pressed his back against the blunt corner where the tunnel met the wall and sank slowly down onto a crouch. Zaknafein could see the warm flush of exertion in his face and throat. “There is…a small stoneware bottle with a short neck on the shelf behind you,” he said, running his hand roughly over the nape of his neck, “could you hand it to me?"

Zaknafein turned slightly and touched each item on he shelf in turn until he bumped something coarse and pear-shaped. Jarlaxle accepted it with trembling fingers and pulled the cork.

“This,” he announced sharply, wrinkling his nose, “is far too weak for what I paid for it.” He took a sip, coughed, then quickly downed the rest of the bottle and pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead as he waited for the potion to take effect.

“Are you alright?” Zaknafein asked at length, his voice a bit gravelly from disuse.

Jarlaxle sighed, letting his feet slip out from under him so he was sitting flat on the floor. “Better than I was an hour ago, I suppose,” he let out a dry laugh that died quickly. “If you are not using that mattress at the moment, I would appreciate it.”

“It is not mine to offer,” Zaknafein replied.

Jarlaxle struggled to pull off his already unlaced boots and collapsed rather pitifully onto his bed, closing his eyes and groaning softly as he worked his shoulder blades back and forth beneath him.

“Would there be any point in my asking what happened to you?” Zaknafein asked.

Jarlaxle said nothing for a very long time, then opened his eyes slowly, looking Zaknafein up and down. “I mislike talking up at you from the flat of my back, if I am to be honest.”

Frowning, Zaknafein sat cross-legged on the uneven floor. Jarlaxle continued to watch him critically for a moment, then shifted over inch by inch until his shoulder was pressed to the wall, leaving half the mattress empty. He gave Zaknafein another long, expectant look.

“Or don’t,” he muttered vacantly when the stoic boy gave no indication that he intended to move.

To his surprise, Zaknafein finally pushed himself up and climbed hesitantly into the space Jarlaxle had vacated, not even grumbling in protest as he did. The mattress was not really meant for two people; they bumped at the elbows, and Zaknafein bent his legs somewhat awkwardly to keep their knees from touching, but neither of them spoke a word of complaint.

Jarlaxle sighed again. “It is my own fault,” he said quietly, “I have made enemies in the wrong places and left myself with too little leverage.”  


“That is vague, even for you.”

Jarlaxle smiled. “It does not bear repeating. Suffice to say, Zaknafein, that no one ever makes out well in bargains with priestesses, and I should have known that.” He paused for a while, then added bitterly, “I shall never get the taste of that bitch out of my mouth.”

Zaknafein tensed up so suddenly that he was sure Jarlaxle felt it. Males did not say such things, not aloud, not if they wanted to live.

“They would call that blasphemy,” he mumbled.

“I call it cathartic, and I care not what you call it.” Jarlaxle agreed, unconcerned.

Zaknafein dampened his lips. “Do you hate all of them with such fervor?”

“Priestesses?”

“Females.”

Jarlaxle sneered. “I hate any creature that thinks itself greater than I.”

Zaknafein did not dare press the subject further, and Jarlaxle, exhausted as he was, did not think much of the question. In the long, heavy silence that followed Zaknafein lay very still, chewing his tongue and listening pensively as Jarlaxle’s breathing grew slow and shallow.

His disjointed thoughts converged, slowly, into a fine point on the few inconsequential inches of Jarlaxle’s arm that remained in contact with his own. He remembered – and indeed could not stop himself from remembering – with perfect clarity every time Jarlaxle had ever touched him, from the sucker punch in the Crucible to Jarlaxle’s damp fingers on the raw skin of his wrist. Zaknafein prayed that his companion was too deeply asleep to hear the way his breath shuddered as he relived the few exquisite moments of anathema that had curled around his soul and dug in deep.

He could hardly distinguish now which bits of his memories were real and which he had so vividly imagined for himself in is misery. He turned onto his side, away from Jarlaxle, and let the guilt roil and burn in the pit of his stomach like acid.

Boys fucked other boys all the time, and nobody cared much when they did. Females were choosy, and few of them were interested in impetuous, lately-pubescent Academy students with no experience. Boys took what they could get, by persuasion or by mutual agreement or sometimes by force, but always grudgingly; not because another male was ever their first choice.

Yet Zaknafein had never wanted Kithaerna, had never felt anything for her but fear and contempt, even before he’d known the extent of her sadism. The thought alone was criminal; priestesses called it _yul ll’yandrosa_. It was as much blasphemy as anything Jarlaxle had said, and Jarlaxle…

Helplessly, he turned his face further into the mattress and closed his eyes.

He wanted Jarlaxle: the more fiercely he denied it, the more fully it consumed him. The mere brush of Jarlaxle’s skin affected him more profoundly than anything Kithaerna had ever subjected him to.

Minutes stretched out into eons as he laid there in silence, fear and uncertainty crushing the air from his chest.

Finally, Jarlaxle shifted a little, sighed blearily, and stretched out just enough to nudge Zaknafein’s shoulder. Zaknafein tried not to flinch.

“Are you hungry?” Jarlaxle mumbled blithely.

Zaknafein made a slightly confused noise and Jarlaxle laughed.

“I asked if you are hungry, you have been down here for two days.”

Zaknafein hesitated. “A bit.”

“What do you want?”

Zaknafein was pulled from his despondency for a moment by the realization that he’d never been asked what he wanted to eat before. He was a commoner, he ate what he was given. At the Academy most meals consisted of a sort of stew made of different kinds of mushroom, nutritious and high in calories, but with the taste and consistency of mud. They got actual meat from time to time, but he had only a general idea what animals it came from.

“Anything.” He replied flatly.

“Do you like fish?”

“I have never had fish.”

Jarlaxle propped himself up on his elbow and turned to Zaknafein abruptly. “Really? That is tragic. Have you ever had bread?”

Zaknafein remained where he was, still turned toward the edge of the mattress. “What is bread?”

Jarlaxle screwed up his face as he thought about it. “You know…I am not certain myself, traders bring sacks of powdery stuff from the surface and somehow they make a spongy sort of…something out of it. At any rate, it is excellent and I shall not see you deprived of it.” He rolled out of bed, maneuvering awkwardly so as not to jostle Zaknafein too badly, and started digging amongst his belongings for a fresh shirt.

“I see your good humor has returned undaunted.” Zaknafein mumbled, piqued in spite of himself.

“Ah, my friend,” Jarlaxle sighed with a smile, “I have had one minor pain-blocking invocation and one truly unpleasant watered-down healing potion. My foot hurts, my back hurts, my knees hurt, my head hurts…good humor is all I have left and I am not about to let you spoil that for me.”

Zaknafein smirked. “Where are you going, then?”

“Manyfolk.”

“The Bazaar?” Zaknafein frowned.

Jarlaxle slipped his shirt on over his head and gave Zaknafein a percipient look. “You noticed, surely, that cutting through the Bazaar was not the shortest route from the Academy to this part of the Clawrift?”

“I did.” Zaknafein pushed himself up slowly and sat back on his knees, rubbing at the sheet lines on his face.

“Well Manyfolk is a common enough place for bored, impertinent Academy boys to sneak off to at night,” Jarlaxle explained, “It is a good foil, no one ever assumes that I am going any further, but I find it necessary to actually turn up there every now and again, to keep up appearances. There is no shortage of entertainment, at least.”

“I do not have money,” Zaknafein said, “or anything worth trading.”

“Good thing I have lately wronged you then, eh my friend?” Jarlaxle announced jovially, upending a metal box and dumping a few coins into his palm. “You can milk that personal debt for a while longer.”

When Zaknafein did not respond Jarlaxle turned back to look at him. “Or…have I presumed too much?” He asked, with no hint of mocking in his hesitance.  


Zaknafein’s jaw clenched a little as he considered his answer. “You did wrong me,” he said quietly, “ but I, for my part, have misjudged you.”

Jarlaxle cracked an uncertain smile. “No more so than I deserved,” he conceded.

Zaknafein evaded his gaze for a moment.

“I do hope this means we are allies again,” Jarlaxle added, taking a step closer and holding out a hand to help Zaknafein to his feet. “I had started looking for a replacement, but I have a certain weakness for destructive mood swings and in that regard you are a hard act to follow.”

Zaknafein could hardly believe that he was laughing, and Jarlaxle’s smile widened reflexively.

“Someday,” Zaknafein warned, taking Jarlaxle’s hand, “you are going to insult the wrong person.”

“I do not doubt it,” Jarlaxle replied.

They lapsed into comfortable silence as they stood facing each other, their smiles lingering as both boys silently acknowledged the profound sense of comfort they felt at being back on good terms.

“Come on then,” Jarlaxle said brightly, “Enough of feeling sorry for ourselves.”

“You will be at it again in a moment.”

“You _wound_ me, Zaknafein.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * "Gender Treachery" (here in Drow as "yul ll’yandrosa") is a phrase I borrowed from Margaret Atwood, the cultural context is very similar. You're a breeder or you're a traitor.


	11. Elg'cahl zhah Medose ulu Mechrola P'luin Dos Tyavus Ssinhya (Poison is Harder to Swallow Once You Have Tasted Honey)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just realized that the proverb is also kind of a pun.  
> You'll get it.

Scowling, Zaknafein crushed a bit of the porous material between his fingers and watched it slowly expand again on his palm.

“Would you stop playing with that and _eat_ it?” Jarlaxle laughed, nudging Zaknafein’s thigh with his knee in exasperation.

Zaknafein shoved him back halfheartedly but tipped the bit of bread into his mouth and chewed it slowly.

“Well?” Jarlaxle demanded.

Zaknafein thought about it for a moment, then reached out and plucked another bite off the small loaf. “Not bad,” he offered.

Jarlaxle snorted imperiously. “You eat lizard tails and mushroom slime without complaint, I buy you surface food and all you have to say is ‘ _not bad_ ’.”

He shrugged, trying not to smile. Jarlaxle had indeed gone to a great deal of effort to find a merchant who sold the stuff. Zaknafein appreciated it on principle alone, but seeing Jarlaxle’s self-satisfied pride deflate was too good a thing to miss. “It is better than mushroom slime.”

Jarlaxle waved his hand dismissively and folded his elbows on the low table.

“I like it though, really.”

Jarlaxle ignored him. “If you are not going to eat it, give it to me.” He leaned forward and reached across the tabletop but Zaknafein snatched the bread and held it out of reach.

“I _am_ going to eat it.”

“If you are not going to _appreciate_ it...”

The other patrons of the small tent – one other drow and a few duergar – glanced up sourly as the two boys fell into a good-natured but rather conspicuous tussle, kicking the table loudly and toppling off the cushions they had been sitting on as Zaknafein stubbornly held the bread out of Jarlaxle’s reach.

Zaknafein knew how stupid he was being by causing a scene. In passing he realized that Jarlaxle probably knew it as well, but he was caught off guard by Jarlaxle’s closeness, by the firm grip on his forearm and Jarlaxle’s warm thigh pressed up against his own. Finally, anxious that his friend would realize that his heart was pounding from something other than exertion, he stuffed the last bit of bread into his mouth and gave a muffled, triumphant laugh.

Jarlaxle let up with a huff and shrugged his shirt back into place, finally glancing up to acknowledge the thick fog of disdain in the air. “Well,” he muttered, careful not to make direct eye contact with anyone, “I think that is more than enough socializing for one evening.” Zaknafein, likewise wary of their audience, nodded slightly and got to his feet. He followed Jarlaxle to the door and out into the narrow causeway. They picked a footpath more or less at random and walked, aimlessly, shoulder to shoulder for a while, Zaknafein with his hands shoved somewhat defensively into his pockets.

It was getting late, the market streets were less crowded now than they had been an hour ago when the pair had arrived, but Zaknafein felt somehow more conspicuous: as though everyone he passed were watching him, intently and maliciously. Perhaps they were. In the brief comfort and quiet of Jarlaxle’s warren it had been easy to forget the danger and treachery that ran thick in Menzoberranzan, to forget the brooding eyes that followed him always. This and worse was what awaited him, he knew. His life was and always would be a thing of ruthlessness and paranoia and fear.

As they meandered down the uneven path, dodging passersby and tent pegs, Jarlaxle reached out idly and laid his hand on Zaknafein’s shoulder to stop him bumping into a taut line. The contact was light, amicable, but Zaknafein turned with a start and caught Jarlaxle’s forearm.

Both boys froze in place.

It wasn’t betrayal he feared, not even in that spilt second of preoccupation. What he feared was the touch itself, the ease and the familiarity of it – the slightest suggestion of intimacy. He knew now that he could not bear to let Jarlaxle simply touch him as though it were nothing, as though it meant nothing. It was too late for that.

Zaknafein’s grip softened as Jarlaxle watched him bemusedly.

“Have I hurt you?” Jarlaxle asked, knowing the answer but seeming almost to have expected Zaknafein’s reaction.

Both stood motionless for a few breaths, gazes locked and muscles tense, before Zaknafein closed his fist tight around Jarlaxle’s arm again and pulled him into the narrow space between a tent and a crumbling masonry wall. Abruptly, he balled his fists in Jarlaxle’s shirt and shoved him against the stone. He realized far too late how rough he was being, but he couldn’t take it back now, couldn’t stop his momentum. He pinned Jarlaxle so tightly that he could feel the rhythm of the smaller boy’s pulse beneath his skin, feel his unsteady breathing and the warmth of his body.

“Did you mean what you said?” He demanded, his voice a hoarse whisper, his hands trembling visibly.

Jarlaxle remained very still, his palms flat against the wall. “I mean everything I say, to varying degrees.”

His grip tightened reflexively. “Jarlaxle,” he pleaded, “If you have anything resembling respect or affection for me, you will not let me go on telling myself that it was some fever dream. Did you mean what you said, when I asked what I was worth to you?”

Jarlaxle hesitated. “I did,” He said softly, “So punch me for it, if that makes it easier for you to bear.”

Zaknafein slowly released his hold on Jarlaxle’s shirt, remorse building thick in his throat, but he could not quite bring himself to step back. He let his hands drift idly downward until they hovered near Jarlaxle’s hips, his fingertips resting lightly on the cobbled wall.

Jarlaxle remained unmoving and cautious, but his eyes glinted knowingly. “Had you hoped for a different answer?”

Zaknafein swallowed hard but his voice still cracked when he spoke. “Whatever I had hoped, it was made hollow long before you spoke a word to me.”

With the slow, deliberate care of one tending a wounded animal, Jarlaxle took his palms from the wall and let them rest along the shallow curve of Zaknafein’s waist. “Whatever you have done that you think to be so damning –”

Zaknafein flinched sharply and turned his gaze to the floor. “I thought of you,” he confessed in a trembling whisper, “I thought of you when she had me last.”

Jarlaxle paused a moment, surprised at Zaknafein's admission, then dared a small smile. “Then did I not keep my promise?”

Zaknafein’s hands finally came to rest on Jarlaxle’s hips, squeezing hard enough to hurt and trussing up his shirt just enough that Zaknafein could feel a tiny stripe of bare skin beneath his fingers. “Why have you done this to me, Jarlaxle?”

Jarlaxle laughed cynically. “It seems to me that _I_ have done very little, my friend.”

Driven by an impulse that he was powerless to control, Zaknafein slid his fingertips slowly beneath the hem of Jarlaxle’s shirt, wandering along his hipbones, pressing into soft skin and firm muscle. He berated himself even as he did it, biting down hard on his lower lip and hoping that Jarlaxle would make him stop, would be rightfully angry at the incongruity of his actions.

Instead, Jarlaxle let his hips tilt forward slightly at the gentle pull, the lingering shadow of a smile in his eyes as he watched fear and disbelief and desire fight for control of Zaknafein’s face.

“Zak –” Before he could think of a sentence to follow the conspiratorial whisper, Zaknafein’s hand slid down to unbuckle Jarlaxle’s belt. His breath caught slightly in surprise.

“I owe you a debt,” Zaknafein murmured, loosening the laces on Jarlaxle’s trousers with unsteady fingers.

“That was given freely,” He breathed through his disbelieving grin.

“Not for that.”

Jarlaxle pressed himself hard against the wall and gasped more than a little at the uncertain pressure of Zaknafein’s palm on his cock, as astonished as he was aroused, struggling not to laugh with elation.

At any moment, he was sure, Zak was going to realize what he was doing, respond violently, and then spend several days working off his self-loathing, but Jarlaxle couldn’t deny that he’d wanted this. Whether it was worth the trouble or not, at this very moment the rhapsody of Zaknafein’s breath and pulse and the slow, supplicant movement was intoxicating, and consequence could wait a few moments longer.

Pulling his friend closer, he pressed his own hand firmly over the back of Zaknafen’s, lacing their fingers together and urging him on. To his immense delight Zaknafein seemed happy to take direction. Jarlaxle was already breathing as though he’d run for miles. He was not callow, and he was certainly not in the habit of being so quickly and so thoroughly piqued by a little succorant touch, but the sheer surprise he felt at Zaknafein’s sudden boldness left him giddy, made him pliant.

Suddenly, he held Zaknafein’s hand still. Their eyes met.

“What –”

“It happens that I like you in my debt, Zaknafein Do’Urden,” he panted.

“Jarlaxle –”

Generally disinterested in whatever it was Zaknafein was trying to say, Jarlaxle pushed his hand aside and dropped to his knees. He had Zak’s fly undone before he had quite registered what was happening, but when the flat of Jarlaxle’s tongue brushed slow and warm up Zaknafein’s cock the boy suddenly forgot how to breathe.

Jarlaxle would have liked nothing better than to see his friend’s face at that moment, but he contented himself with the soft exclamation he heard as he took Zaknafein into his mouth.

Zaknafein’s heart raced desperately to keep up. Utterly overwhelmed, he braced one palm against the wall and rested the other at the nape of Jarlaxle’s neck, neither pushing nor stopping him, just desperately confirming that he was real and tangible and not some cruel trick. If it was a dream, he knew it was not his own. He could never have let himself dream this.

When Jarlaxle’s fingers hooked into his belt loop and pulled him closer he let himself be guided, let Jarlaxle pace him as he liked. Zaknafein was glad of it. He could hardly keep his feet, much less trust himself to hold a steady rhythm, and he was not so greedy as to want more than the slow, exquisite torment that Jarlaxle’s tongue was already giving him. That alone was too much.

Zaknafein had the faintest notion to pull away, fearful that to do otherwise would be obscene, but even that faculty was beyond him. He gasped sharply, murmured Jarlaxle’s name, and came with dizzying intensity into his lover’s mouth.

Jarlaxle barely flinched, and when Zaknafein stammered a breathless string of apologies Jarlaxle only smiled and tilted his head up to press his damp lips to Zaknafein’s bare stomach.

That shut him up.

Jarlaxle sighed and shifted his weight back from his knees to the balls of his feet, reminded very suddenly of how badly they still ached from the fall. He leaned against the wall as he stood, pulling an unsteady Zaknafein tight against him.

Zaknafein took a slow, steadying breath and as he regained his balance he let his thigh press a little harder against Jarlaxle’s imploring erection. Clumsily, he slid his hand between their bodies again, but Jarlaxle stopped him.

“Just let me, please…”

Jarlaxle smiled ruefully but kept his grip on Zaknafein’s wrist. “Put yourself together, Zak.”

“What?”

“Fix your clothes.” Jarlaxle fumbled to shirr up his own laces and belt as he spoke, though the process was made difficult by his undaunted state of arousal.

“I do not understand what you want from me, Jarlaxle.” Barbs of frustration dug into Zaknafein’s strained voice as he took an uncertain step back and hastily made himself decent.

“I want you to stop being so dramatic,” Jarlaxe said with a thin smile. “Come on.” He took Zaknafein’s arm and led him out of the narrow alley, back onto the nearly deserted footpath. When they had gone only a few steps, Zaknafein pulled free and hurried to walk abreast of his companion.

“Really, enough of this, what are you doing?”

Jarlaxle raised an eyebrow. “What you want to be doing. Only not in a filthy corner at the east end of the Bazaar.”

Jarlaxle continued ahead but Zaknafein fell a step behind once again, his toes dragging and his brow furrowed slightly. An unexpected but powerful knot of fear tightened high up in his stomach, and in his distraction he let Jarlaxle get still further past him.

This had been a mistake. It was not that his desire had waned, but what manner of contract had he now consigned himself to? What would be expected of him? What Jarlaxle had done for him was no small thing; surely he would want the favor returned, and if he wanted privacy perhaps he expected far more than that. Boys never gave it up for free, and inexperienced as Zaknafein was he knew it was with good reason.

Absorbed in his trepidation, he was surprised enough to give a start when Jarlaxle doubled back for him and laid hand on his arm. The rogue smiled warmly as Zaknafein looked up at him, and Zaknafein’s doubts were drowned beneath the thumping of his heart.

“So are you coming or not?”

 

Zaknafein took a shuddering inhale as Jarlaxle backed him against the cavern wall and ran both hands up his ribcage beneath his shirt. His skin flushed hot at the slightest touch, and he could feel the warm rush of breath on his throat as he tilted his head back. Borne on that soft sensation was the maddening desire to feel Jarlaxle’s lips against his skin, but though Jarlaxle pinned Zaknafein tight and slid one knee between his thighs, there remained a certain evasiveness in his stance. Zaknafein’s back arched slightly. He told himself the movement was involuntary but knew that the result was to press his erection pleadingly against Jarlaxle’s hip. He felt more than saw Jarlaxle’s smile.

“You are easy, did you know that?” Jarlaxle crooned.

Zaknafein growled softly, but there was more want than anger in it. He laid his hands firmly on the small of Jarlaxle’s back and with one hard roll of his hips he proved that Jarlaxle’s surfeit was not so unshakable either. Jarlaxle groaned softly, then took a handful of Zaknafein’s shirt and stepped back, dragging him along. They fell onto the mattress in a graceless tangle, Jarlaxle’s knee hitting Zaknafein’s thigh hard enough to bruise and Jarlaxle biting his own tongue slightly, but neither truly felt it, not then at least. Zaknafein propped himself up clumsily on his hands and knees and watched Jarlaxle squirm as he unbuckled his belt and struggled to unlace his fly, the hem of his shirt pushed up to his sternum and his stomach undulating softly with each breath.

Zaknafein imagined what it would feel like to run his tongue down the shallow furrows of Jarlaxle’s stomach, imagined how his skin would taste, but the mere sight of him was so captivating that Zaknafein could not bring himself to move.

Jarlaxle’s trousers finally fell loose around his hips and his mouth opened slightly as he ran his palm down between his legs.

“Am I here for decoration?” Zaknafein asked uncertainly.

Jarlaxle smiled dazedly. “A fine one you are, too.”

Zaknafein set the flat of his palm on Jarlaxle’s stomach and felt his body tense and relax slightly as he touched himself. “It is not for a sense of obligation that I ask, Jarlaxle.”

Jarlaxle fell still and gazed up at his friend for a moment, almost distrustful. “Turn over.”

Zaknafein hesitated, but Jarlaxle took ahold of his shirt again, pushed him – unresisting – onto his back, and straddled his waist. For a moment their faces were inches apart, eyes lined up and lips nearly touching, still but for the rush of blood beneath heated skin. With a soft, plaintive sound, Jarlaxle pressed his cock against Zaknafein’s exposed stomach and thrust forward. Zaknafein held Jarlaxle’s hips firmly and pulled him down again, arching his back to the same slow rhythm and bracing his feet against the ticking for purchase.

Fully consumed in the sensation of each other’s bodies, the slow rutting grew fervent, wanton until they were breathless and trembling, damp with sweat and dizzy with euphoria. With a muffled cry that sent chills through Zaknafein’s core, Jarlaxle shuddered and came in a warm rush over his lover’s stomach. His body relaxed in slow waves, his chest heaving until he got his breath back.

It was several heady, disoriented seconds before Zaknafein even realized that he’d done the same, and that the fabric over his groin was soaked through and clinging uncomfortably to his skin. He could not quite bring himself to care.

Jarlaxle rolled over onto his back, running a hand through his damp hair and closing his eyes for a moment as a serene exhaustion wore away the cunning edge of his features. Part of him was still waiting for a backlash, for the upwelling of fear and anger and regret that he knew still lurked somewhere in Zaknafein’s mind, perhaps even closer to the surface now that the heat of the moment was past.

He heard Zaknafein laugh softly.

Jarlaxle peered at him from beneath his eyelashes and sneered a little. “What?”

“Have you nothing snide to say?” He asked.

Jarlaxle smiled, relieved. “If you were about to mock me,” he warned, “take a hard look at yourself first.” He sat up, maneuvered gingerly to the edge of the mattress, and – with some momentary wobbliness – got to his feet.

Zaknafein gave a slight start when a handful of fabric was dropped onto the ticking beside him.

“Not standard issue but I doubt anyone will notice,” Jarlaxle said apologetically.

Zaknafein stared dubiously at the pile of clothing, clearly more perturbed by it than by his current state of indignity. “There is no one here but you and I,” he said coldly.

Jarlaxle paused in the midst of sorting out his own clothing and sighed softly. “And you mean to stay here forever, do you Zak?”

Zaknafein pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes and tilted his head back dejectedly. “I cannot bear that pit of vipers, Jarlaxle.”

Jarlaxle knelt at the edge of the mattress, wincing through the pain in his knees, and pulled down the hem of Zaknafein’s shirt to scrub the worst of the mess off his friend’s skin.

“Nothing lasts forever, Zak, for better or worse,” he said softly, “the Academy is not your life, and someday you will be free of it. Just not today.”

Zaknafein’s dread was not so shortsighted as that. The Academy was just one spike in a wheel that would not stop turning until the day he died. Jarlaxle’s life was no easier, but as someone with no clear place in drow society he had the luxury of uncertainty. Zaknafein found it difficult to share his optimism. With slow, bitter resignation he began pulling off his clothes.

 

The sounds of furtive sleep in the barracks that night were like scales digging into Zaknafein’s flesh. He lay awake, resenting every backstabbing drow boy who dared breathe, resenting every conniving face he would see in he morning, and perhaps most of all resenting Jarlaxle for reminding him that there were better things in this world that would never be his.


	12. Natha Abbil zhah biu Ogglin Vel'uss uriu Naut Chi'us Dos Quin (A Friend is an Enemy Who has Not Betrayed You Yet)

There had been a great deal of politicking over Zaknafein’s brief desertion. Officially, of course, it had never happened. No master was stupid enough to report back to the Matron of house Do’Urden that her investment piece had simply gone missing for a while, so when the boy reappeared there was a silent consensus to let the dog lie and speak nothing of it. Students and lower officials could not be allowed to believe that a boy – especially a lowborn one – could take his leave of Melee-Magthere for a few days and not be flayed alive screaming and fed to the cockroaches, but anyone with any sense knew that he had gotten away with something.

And out of that grudge Zaknafein had more than his due of punishment.

He lost his morning meal rights when a classmate pushed him to the ground before the start of the bout and stood on his hand until he screamed, insisting loudly to the moderator that Zaknafein had tripped. Not only did he miss his chance to claim a serviceable weapon, once he was armed his fingers were too stiff to hold it correctly. It still took two boys everything they had to defeat him.

When he was finally allowed to eat in the afternoon, an older student slid up behind him and knocked his bowl out of his hands without even pretending it was an accident. Zaknafein bit his tongue and fumed in resigned silence as his classmates sniggered loudly at his misfortune.

In his last lesson of the day he had his nose viciously bloodied when a master singled him out to demonstrate an overhead parry. Zaknafein went through the motions precisely as they were asked of him, bitterly aware of the deliberately flawed instructions, of the gaping holes in his defense that made it all too easy for the master’s pommel to smash into his face. As he stumbled to his knees, one hand pressed to his nose and mouth as blood ran between his fingers, the master gave a soliloquy on his ineptitude to the boys who stood watching. Zaknafein did not look up, but he could feel their satisfied grins.

The next day – and his second round of abuse – was harder to endure, not least of all because he suffered it without a moment of sleep in the interim. The blow to his face had left him with a mild concussion, and as he lay awake the pressure in his head felt enough like Kithaerna’s psychic calling to make him sick to his stomach for hours on end.

The hate in Zaknafein’s bruise-masked eyes was so chilling after that second sleepless night that although he was attacked no less often and with no less vitriol, those looking on instantly lost the nerve to gawk or titter. Even the fifth-year boy who threw him against a wall during an obstacle course seemed to doubt his choices the moment Zaknafein turned and fixed him with a dead-eyed stare. Lives would have ended that day if Zaknafein had not so thoroughly lost the will to retaliate.

He saw nothing of Jarlaxle. The implications of that were not lost on him. The scoundrel had proven time and again that he could slip in and out of Zaknafein’s life with relative ease, so his absence – under the circumstances – could only have been intentional. He dwelt on this; one moment with smoldering anger, the next with icy gratitude, and every now and then with a sudden and painful sort of loneliness.

On the third night, virtually delirious with exhaustion, he stumbled back into the barracks later than most of his classmates. So deteriorated was his cognition that he genuinely did not realize his bed was already occupied until he was just a few steps from it. Stifling a sharp inhale, he took a step back, watching a sly grin spread across Malice Do’Urden’s face.

She sat at the stone edge of the alcove, ankles crossed primly, reclining on one elbow and toying with a lock of her hair. Zaknafein’s heart hammered painfully against his ribs at the sight of her, and she smiled more broadly at the distress evident in his face.

 _‘You have little enough to fear from me, precious boy.’_  She signed, sitting up slowly so she would not have to do it one-handed. ‘ _In fact, you might thank me.’_

Zaknafein had not the patience to be tactful so he replied bluntly, ‘ _what do you want?’_

She narrowed her eyes to let him know that she had not missed the effrontery in his statement, but chose not to remark upon it. _‘I have heard you are acquainted with Baenre’s thirdboy.’_

That was certainly the last thing he ever expected her to say, but it filled him with dread all over again. He struggled not to panic, telling himself that if Kithaerna knew anything of what had gone on between himself and Jarlaxle, her response certainly would not be to send Malice to creep into his bed at night. Then again, if Malice was trying to blackmail him, his situation might be no better. 

 _‘In a manner of speaking.’_  He responded coldly, his fingers a bit unsteady.

Malice put a slender hand to her mouth as she struggled not to laugh. ‘ _It is not what you think, lowborn. My sister’s game is up.’_

He did not dare to guess what that meant, only prayed that she would explain quickly and end his suffering.

 _‘Our mother was livid about your little disappearing act_ ,’ she went on, ‘ _the masters at the Academy did not report it, of course, but we know well enough what goes on. She was ready to have you scalped, or some such barbarousness, but I could hardly pass up the opportunity to sully Kithaerna’s sterling reputation. I told our mother about her midnight meddling, insinuated that she had abused you to within an inch of your life. That may have been the truth, actually, she is hardly a gentle thing at the best of times.’_ She glanced up at Zaknafein to get a gauge on how close to home she had hit, then gave a dismissive wave and continued. ‘ _Anyway, Kithaerna has had a little scolding in your place. How she pouted when mother took her toy from her…’_

Zaknafein gave a start and Malice turned to look at him again. ‘ _She –‘_ he could hardly form the words, ‘ _She is forbidden from me?’_

Malice pursed her lips, chiding him. ‘ _The look in your eyes is blasphemous, Zaknafein. And no, not forbidden, not indefinitely. Only until the Grand Melee, two tendays from now. Mother needs you in decent enough shape to uphold House Do’Urden’s reputation. After that, provided she does not damage you permanently, I imagine she could not care less if Kithaerna has her fun. You are decent enough breeding stock, what is the worst that could happen?’_

Zaknafein struggled with that realization, but did a somewhat better job at hiding it. ‘ _What does any of this have to do with Jarlaxle?’_

_‘Tangential. You must deliver him a message for me.’_

_‘He is avoiding me_ ,’ he responded honestly, and to admit it stung him far more than he let on.

 _‘Well if you do see him_ ,’ she pressed, ‘ _tell him this and exactly this: Auryth is ambitious, and a malcontent.’_

Zaknafein frowned at the vagueness of her message, fiercely averse to the notion that Malice and Jarlaxle might have any kind of conspiratorial dealings to which he was not party. It reminded him of the likelihood that his friendship with Jarlaxle was – as friendships in Menzoberranzan so often were – some kind of elaborate scheme.

 _‘Sleep well, Zaknafein_ ,’ she added sweetly, standing to leave and touching his face gently as she did so. ‘ _Make my mother proud.’_

Zaknafein could have spent yet another night awake and distraught by any number of the things Malice had forced him to consider, but there was one thing for which he was grateful: Kithaerna would not call him tonight, or at all for the next two tendays if Malice was to be believed. He did not want to trust her; he had no reason to, but her claim was a solace he desperately needed.

* * *

 

“You are dangerous to be seen with these days,” Rhyl’lochar remarked dryly, holding out a small obsidian knife.

Jarlaxle took it and spun it between his fingers. “Compared to whom?” He wondered with a smile, fishing a small glass orb out of his pocket and handing it over as repayment. “Where did you get this?” Jarlaxle added as an afterthought, running a thumb over the immaculately smooth blade.

“I am not at liberty to say.”

“And why is that?”

“Was it not you who told me never to reveal all my secrets?” Rhyl’lochar quipped snidely, and Jarlaxle suppressed an approving nod.

“How old are you, Rhyl’lochar?” He asked.

“Twenty-one.”

Jarlaxle smirked. “There is hope for you yet.”

“I mean to survive,” the younger boy affirmed, “why do you think I endear myself to you?”

Jarlaxle snorted. “Well since I am your elder by a few years, let me dispense a bit of wisdom: a friend is an enemy minus a motive. If one day it behooves me to betray you, the favors you have done for me will mean very little, and the closer I am to you, the more devastating an end I can bring about when I do turn on you. Do not _endear_ yourself to me, make yourself indispensable, and therefore invulnerable.”

“And how am I to do that?” Rhyl’lochar asked.

“That is for you to figure out.”

“And are you yourself invulnerable, Jarlaxle?”

Jarlaxle laughed. “If I were not I would be long since dead.”

* * *

 

Zaknafein had missed a bath day in his absence, so although he had six days worth of blood and sweat – among other things – clinging to him, he was less than enthused about being off his guard and unclothed when so many of his classmates still clearly had it out for him. He kept his back to the wall as he removed his clothes, and deliberately chose a corner of the pool that was sparsely occupied. A few boys glanced at him, but with no more malice than usual, as far as he could tell.

He kept reminding himself to get clean and get gone. He was pushing his luck already, hoping that no one on this rotation cared enough to attack him, but even after he had scrubbed every inch of himself several times over he couldn’t help sighing and sinking down a little further into the warm water. Ripples brushed lazily at his lips as he watched the bright steam drift on the surface. His thoughts wandered, gravitated toward pleasant musings, one pleasant musing in particular, as there were so few of them in his life on the whole.

“Zak?”

Zaknafein’s eyes snapped open and with a slow breath he turned to face the soft inquiry.

Jarlaxle, for once, did not quite manage a smile as he met his friend’s icy gaze.

It took Zaknafein a few seconds to find his voice, and in the meantime it struck him – in a way that it never had before – that Jarlaxle was standing there before him naked. He had seen Jarlaxle naked before, certainly, but he only realized in that most distracted and inopportune of moments that he had never really _looked_.

“You have been scarce,” Zaknafein said finally, grateful that the tightness in his throat was not especially audible.

Jarlaxle chewed his tongue. “I…have had much to deal with,” he replied. “May I?”

Zaknafein raised an eyebrow and nodded, then moved aside to let Jarlaxle step down onto the ledge beside him.

“Is that broken?” Jarlaxle asked after a moment of edged silence.

“What?” Zaknafein snapped, far too loudly. He had been staring at Jarlaxle’s collarbone in such a meditative way that he almost did not realize that he was doing it.

Jarlaxle tipped his head slightly to intercept his friend’s suddenly very scattered gaze. “Your nose, is it broken?”

Zaknafein leaned back against the lip of the pool and prodded at the tender skin vacantly with his fingertips. “Probably.” He fell into silence again, but this time he stared into the soft-glowing water. “Have you been avoiding me deliberately?” He asked, his voice muffled somewhat by the heel of his hand.

Jarlaxle blew a long breath, touched his hair thoughtfully, and glanced up to make sure that no one was close enough to overhear. “Yes.”

Zaknafein winced slightly. “And is that my business?”

Jarlaxle brushed his knuckles lightly over his lips as he rolled the answer over a few times. “You made your feelings very clear to me the last time our friendship skirted the edge of…something other than friendship,” he murmured, “I have come to understand that how you feel in the moment may offend your more rational sensibilities. I did not want a repeat of that, for both our sakes.”

Zaknafein felt a sharp pang of guilt. “I cannot rightly hold that against you,” he admitted. “I should never have blamed you for my own failings, for my own mistakes, and I do not intend to again.”

Jarlaxle’s brow pulled into deep furrows. “Your mistakes?” He asked flatly.

Zaknafein turned to his friend, meeting his eyes this time, and holding steady. “I have made many,” he said, “but few that I have regretted so little.”

Jarlaxle’s expression was distant and unreadable, and when after several breaths he still did not respond, Zaknafein set his palms on the ledge dejectedly and pulled himself out of the water. He was mostly dressed by the time Jarlaxle caught up with him, having bothered to hastily put his pants back on, but nothing else.

“I need this from you,” Jarlaxle demanded quietly, his expression making it clear that he did not intend to elaborate.

Zaknafein looked up at him, perplexed, but when Jarlaxle gave a beckoning tilt of his head and led on, he followed. They left the pavilion and descended a narrow staircase into the under-structure of Melee-Magthere. It was a part of the upper-class barracks, not a wing that either of them occupied, but like all the barracks it was vacant in the middle of the day.

Jarlaxle turned on his heels, and before Zaknafein could ask what they were doing, the rogue seized his upper arms and pressed his mouth to the hollow of Zaknafein’s throat.

Zaknafein tensed up and tried to recoil from sheer surprise, but not for more than an instant. His muscles went slack as he felt the tip of Jarlaxle’s tongue against his skin, the faint press of teeth and the whispering shudder of breath. The grip on his arms tightened and Jarlaxle pressed him into a back-step until the backs of his knees bumped the edge of the nearest bunk. He put one palm against the stone to stop himself from tripping, but when Jarlaxle’s hand moved from his arm to his hip and then slid impatiently up his shirt, he let go of his own accord.

He was flat on his back with Jarlaxle astride his waist before he could take a full inhale, raking his fingers through Jarlaxle’s short hair as the rogue sucked a tender bruise into the skin near his carotid. Zaknafein moaned sharply and was hushed with an urgent whisper against his ear. Jarlaxle’s body shifted and tensed as he struggled out of his half-laced trousers, then pushed Zaknafein’s slightly damp shirt off over his head.

Zaknafein bit down hard on his lip as Jarlaxle pulled out the ties on his fly as well, and suddenly there was nothing between them, just the heady, unfettered sensation of skin meeting skin. The pressure against Zaknafein’s groin intensified as Jarlaxle spread his knees a little wider and shifted his hips back, forcing a shallow arch in his spine and momentarily stopping Zaknafein’s already labored breath.

Jarlaxle slid one hand between them and pressed Zaknafein’s cock into his palm. Zaknafein was about to protest that he didn’t need to, that the friction was enough, but as he realized that Jarlaxle was gently guiding and repositioning him, he found himself at a loss for words. He choked back a soft exclamation as Jarlaxle’s quivering body gave him entry; took him with a slow, breathless pressure that stirred a rush of heat like a tempest in his blood.

He felt the shuddering tension through Jarlaxle’s muscles in a hundred thousand ways, felt him gasp in what Zaknafein was sure had to be pain, his skin dampening quickly with sweat, but he set his palms against the blankets and rocked his body smoothly forward and back.

Zaknafein fought desperately not to cry out with each breath, fought harder still not to thrust too hard with Jarlaxle’s movements, each one of which was devastating and exquisite and more than he could bear, but the fear that he would hurt Jarlaxle as he did haunted the back of even his pleasure-addled mind.

He lost his battle for control like a capsizing ship: felt the tipping point but was utterly powerless to stop it. Climax overcame him, a sweet catastrophe pushing the air from his lungs, and Jarlaxle’s palm pressed down hard over his mouth to silence him as he rode it out, as the heat in his veins surged and slowly dissipated.

Jarlaxle tipped forward wearily, touching his damp forehead to his lover’s, and without thinking Zaknafein tilted his chin up and let his lips alight on Jarlaxle’s. A heartbeat passed, then two, and Jarlaxle pulled back sharply to rest his weight on his knees. He stumbled over onto the stranger’s bed and rested his shoulder against the wall for support.

“Are you alright?” Zaknafein panted anxiously. The muscles in his stomach trembled and ached as he sat up.

Jarlaxle raised an unsteady hand and formed the sign for ‘ _very_ ,’ but by the sheen in his eyes he didn’t look it.

Zaknafein slowly pushed himself into a crouch and moved closer to his friend. He ran his palm gently up Jarlaxle’s thigh, earning a soft sigh as he did, and found to his surprise that Jarlaxle was still very much aroused. Yet Zaknafein had hardly touched him when Jarlaxle once again frustrated his efforts.

“It is quarter dark already, we do not have time for this,” he whispered in protest, and it was not so much the words that gave Zaknafein pause but the confusion they incited.

“You had time for every moment until this one,” Zaknafein snapped, and when he realized the volume of his voice he shifted into hand signs _‘why do you not let me touch you, have I done something wrong?’_

 _‘No,’_ Jarlaxle replied earnestly, _‘no, you have done nothing wrong.’_

_‘Then let me…’_

_‘Not now,’_ Jarlaxle insisted, _‘please, just not now.’_

Zaknafein backed away slightly and though still confounded by the refusal, he nodded his agreement and moved aside to let Jarlaxle get to his feet.

 

In his last lesson of the day, a boy from House DeVir kicked a rock at the back of Zaknafein’s head that hit hard enough to draw blood. In a show of vigor that left several onlookers gaping, Zaknafein turned on the boy, sank a fist into his stomach, kicked out at his heel, and threw him to the ground as hard and as fast as the forces of gravity would allow. As he boy lay winded and choking, Zaknafein straightened up and smiled dangerously, daring anyone else to move against him, daring the instructor to punish him, and in that instant he felt power so profound that it held the whole room in thrall. Not a soul opposed.

 

Jarlaxle lay on his belly that night in the barracks, _almost_ perfectly silent as he rocked his hips and pressed his cock roughly into his palm, the thought of Zaknafein vivid and cloying and far, far too real. He came quickly and hard, still aching for the real thing, his whole body awash with the urgency of desire. As he lay still and forced his pulse to slow, he wondered again just how close he could allow himself to get, how long this could continue before everything he had spent so long building was compromised. For as long as he was not in full control of his own heart, he was far from invulnerable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I seem to have accidentally gotten real poetic with the fucking there. *shrugs*


End file.
